


The Taste of War and Heartache

by thefooliam



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Blood and Injury, Depression, F/F, I am not tagging this with angst with a happy ending, Injury Recovery, Murphy is my fav character from the 100, alcoholic!Clarke, all the fucking angst, fun fact, if you want to know what happens you're gonna have to read it, not Party Girl!Griffin this time, potential PTSD?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-06-08
Packaged: 2018-10-14 04:59:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 36,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10529448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefooliam/pseuds/thefooliam
Summary: After saving the world for the last time, Clarke Griffin finds herself bitter and angry and grieving for more than just the woman she lost.That's until she finds a map that might possibly lead her to the answers she's been looking for.It's a suicide mission. A fool's errand. She's almost certainly going to lose her life in the process.Except Clarke has nothing left to lose and, even if she did, she doesn't care anyway.





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> The title from this story comes from a poem by Nikita Gill. 
> 
> Originally, intended to be a oneshot or small piece for Clexa week, this monstrosity got way out of hand.

**The Taste of War and Heartache**

**Part 1**

_When my time comes around_

_Lay me gently in the cold dark earth_

_No grave can hold my body down_

_I’ll crawl home to her._

_-“Work Song” by Hozier_

 

// 

 

She stumbles inside, drunk and unaware of what she’s doing.

 

It’s been months since she was in this building. It’s been weeks. It’s been hundreds of days that have all somehow blended into each other. Whole lives could have been created in the distance between her visits to this place and she is terrified to realize that.

 

She hates that her first thought is that no new life could replace the one that she lost.

 

Clarke Griffin has saved the world and lost more people than she can count, but there is still only one person she wakes up craving.

 

And that’s why she’s here, she guesses. It’s been hundreds of days and, with each one, the memories are fading. The image of her face is becoming a little less sharp. The ringing of the familiar voice in her ear is becoming dull. It sounds more like her own as the days pass and less like the one that would keep her awake with it’s taunting.

 

She knows that the alcohol and the lack of sleep don’t help, but they do, and that’s the problem. She’s pretty sure that they’re the only things that have kept her going.

 

It’s not like anyone really cares anymore. It didn’t take very long for the great _Wanheda_ to become a joke. She managed to save humanity in less than a month when they only had two left to survive, but it took much less for everyone to forget about her. But it’s not like she gives a crap, anyway. She’d turned around to the opinion that none of them deserved survival before they’d even managed to achieve it.

 

Alcohol became an easy fix to her anger and an even better way to numb her memories.

 

All it took was one drunken night to ruin her reputation.

 

When she woke up the next morning—reliving all the things that she didn’t want to—the first thing she saw was her mother’s angry face and Kane’s ashamed stare at the ground. It was Raven who told her what she’d said to them but it had barely made her blush. Some of it had even made her smirk.

 

Their inability to see the irreparable damage they’d done was one of her greatest disappointments.

 

Everything was ruined but they couldn’t see it.

 

They’d ruined a society, a beautiful earth. Their losses were “for the greater good”, except they weren’t. They would rebuild what they had broken but could not see that they would destroy a rich and wonderful culture with it. It was the stuff of history books. Clarke could see the children of the future already judging their actions.

 

She’s only here because she knows that it’s part of the new leadership’s plan to somehow destroy what’s left of this building and this city and build a brand new one. She’s sure that they’re attempting something symbolic but they don’t have the memories that she has of this place. They never knew the peaceful silence of the hallways at nighttime. They never sat and ate the great feasts that came from the kitchen every evening. They never knew the perpetual smell and flicker of the candles. She would look out of that window and feel like she was on top of the world. She would stand at the edge of the balcony, close her eyes and, when she’d open them, it would feel like she was flying.

 

Polis is nothing but a burned wasteland now, ruined by war. The leftover smoke of all those months ago still rises into the distance.

 

But Clarke can remember the warmth of the vendors who gave her gifts, the smells of the food, and the happy screaming of excited children. She remembers warm, soft eyes always watching her. She remembers going to bed feeling safe and protected.

 

Her time in Polis was happy.

 

_She_ was happy.

 

She doesn’t know how she got here. She doesn’t understand how what was starting to seem like solace suddenly turned into _this_. Looking back, she knows now that if she’d abandoned her people and let them fend for themselves, she would have almost had everything she ever wanted. But instead, in mere hours, she found _peace_ only to lose it.

 

The key to everything was gone, leaving Clarke as the only shadow of what could have been. She managed to save them all once, and then twice, but they still don’t see. They still don’t see that the one person who should have been here to witness all of this was already gone.

 

They want to forget her.

 

They want to erase her existence and Clarke worries that they’re forcing her to do the same.

 

She’s tired and worn and exhausted from her brain to her bones, but somehow she managed to get up here.

 

It’s all rubble now. It’s been battered by bombs, and war, and everything else. It used to be a palace, the most regal place Clarke had ever seen to house the most beautiful thing this world had to offer. Now it’s just an empty shell and Clarke falls to sit on the step before a burned and broken throne wondering what happened.

 

If she closes her eyes tight enough, she can smell her. Musk, and smoke, and—always, surprisingly—flowers.

 

It becomes too much and she stumbles out into the almost non-existent hallway to find her way to the bedroom. It’s more angry and dark like Ontari than it is of who she wants it to be. Without the candles, and in the barely-there light of the moon, it doesn’t have the same grandeur. It’s grey where it should have been gold and Clarke runs her fingers over the foot of the bed where she once found peace. It’s the last remaining item of furniture left in the room and she remembers, disappointedly, that they’d used the rest to block the exits that day she’d destroyed the City of Light.

 

This room smells like the still-settling dust and is not the haven it once was.

 

She doesn’t know how long she sits there but it must be a while because the color of the sky has changed by the time she hears footsteps. She instantly knows who it is.

 

Murphy has the decency to look sheepish before stepping more fully into the room.

 

“I see my mother has you following me still,” she slurs angrily, but she takes the bottle of moonshine that Murphy hands her anyway. Her mother knows that, somehow, Murphy is the only one who can get through to her. Murphy knows that the only way to get through to her is to bring her something to numb the pain. He’s the only one who knows why she truly needs it.

 

He drops down to sit leaning against the footboard like she does, legs kicked out in front of him while hers remain crossed. “No one wants to give the important jobs to a lowlife like me.” Clarke doesn’t respond and Murphy sits quietly with her before reaching over to take a gulp from the glass bottle in her hand. “Is this the first time you’ve been here since—”

 

“Yeah,” Clarke whispers before he can say something she doesn’t want to be reminded of.

 

Murphy hands her back the bottle. “It’s full of bad memories.”

 

Clarke grits her jaw and takes a shaky breath before gulping from the bottle.

 

“It has the best memories,” she tells him. “They’re just not here anymore. There’s nothing left here anymore.”

 

Murphy looks away politely. He’s still the only one left who knew, the only one left who saw them together, saw the truth of what they were. Everyone else just assumes and she doesn’t have the energy to correct them. Murphy knows that a part of Clarke’s soul died that day. He knows what truly happened when they put that chip in her neck, when she went into the City of Light. He had asked her quietly that night, when she was unable to sleep, if she’d got to see her. He’d asked her how she’d looked when she had nodded. He had squeezed her hand when she couldn’t tell him.

 

“Ontari probably burned it all,” Clarke whispers, her jaw tingling. “The only thing I have left is that goddamn chip and no way to use it.”

 

The metal case digs into her ribs where it still rests in her inside pocket. It makes her feel calm until Murphy opens his mouth and speaks.

 

“Titus made me take all of her stuff out of here before we let Ontari in,” he says disinterestedly. Clarke turns to him in confusion and he takes the bottle from her and drinks before continuing. “After you left with the chip and I was the new _fleimkepa’s_ assistant, he had me leave Ontari on the throne and then the guards said that her stuff had to be removed before the new _heda_ could be allowed inside. They gave me these boxes to put everything in and then it was taken to Titus’ little shrine.”

 

Clarke frowns. She doesn’t say anything before she’s getting to her feet and heading out of the room. Murphy calls her name the entire way back to the elevators. They’re nothing but a rudimentary pulley system, only created to save the people stuck at the top of the tower that day, but it’s enough to carry the weight of the pair of them. Murphy looks at her with a weird mix of annoyance and worry but doesn’t stop following her as she makes her way back to Titus’ quarters.

 

There’s a part of her that expects it to be empty, but it isn’t. It’s untouched, protected by the legend and stories that follow it. The grounders still respect the memory of their commanders. Everyone else is oblivious to their importance.

 

The room is large.

 

It’s like a museum, full of artifacts that Clarke reaches out to touch, searching desperately for something she recognizes.

 

“Here, Clarke,” Murphy says and, when she turns to him across the room, he stands before a pile of boxes. Instantly, she sees how they have Lexa’s name chiseled into the dark wood. There’s dust already settled thickly atop each of them and that, more than anything, makes her heart ache.

 

“Get out,” she whispers.

 

Murphy sighs. “Clarke.”

 

“Leave,” she repeats, although not unkindly. “Leave me alone. Wait outside. I don’t want you here.”

 

He runs his hand through his hair before sighing and leaving reluctantly. He’s become too accustomed to saving her from her downward spirals. Clarke hears the door close quietly before she moves towards the boxes. Her fingers shake as they find the tops of the wood. There are three boxes in total and Clarke doesn’t pause in lifting the first box, then the second, onto the floor before sitting on the cold flagstones before the three of them.

 

She opens the first box and chokes back a breath, dragging Lexa’s nightgown from inside. It’s soft and cold and, when she brings it up to her nose, it smells of her. It’s a soft and stale version of her scent but Clarke still smothers her face in the fabric and lets free helpless sobs. She stops when she worries her tears might wash her away and folds it unsteadily into a pile beside her.

 

There are books, mostly, and it makes Clarke smile in fondness. She puts them in a pile, fingers stroking the spines of stories from the old world and wondering which one she liked best. There’s jewelry, too. Clarke holds rings and bracelets and necklaces that she never saw her wear. She wonders if they were hers. She wonders if they were the belongings of those she loved.

 

Clarke thumbs through clothing, piles it beside her with the jewelry. Some of the clothes are small and, though Lexa was only tiny, Clarke knows that these clothes are that of a child. These are the things that Lexa wore when she was a nightblood. Her innocence clings to the fabric and Clarke cries for all the things Lexa could have been, for all the things she could have wanted before the color of her blood prevented her from having them. She gasps at the wooden sword and the tiny armor. She gasps at the hand carved wooden toys that litter the corners of the box. She chokes back her breath at the small tub of black war paint that sits at the bottom.

 

She resists the urge to cover her face with it and scurries it into the pocket of her coat instead.

 

She doesn’t know why she returns everything back into the first two boxes before she opens the third one. It feels important and she drags the last box over to the wall she slumps against before she opens it up.

 

It instantly takes her breath away, especially when the first thing she sees is a picture of Lexa, drawn by her own hand.

 

“But it wasn’t finished,” she whispers as she buries her face into her hands. Her fingers tremble over the features of Lexa’s face but the drawing doesn’t do justice to the memories Clarke still has. Her eyes are closed and Clarke wishes she’d been brave enough to just sit before her and draw the perfect outline of her face, her beautiful eyes. She wishes that Lexa had given her a chance to make it better before she secretly scurried it away.

 

Her hands tremble as she folds the drawing and pulls out the case from her pocket before tucking it safely inside with the chip. She hides it away and wipes her eyes, pulls an ornate wooden chest from inside the box and opens it without thinking.

 

Five locks of hair sit inside and Clarke closes it gently out of respect before she sets it aside. She feels awful, just for opening it.

 

She takes a moment before removing the last item from the box. It’s leather binder and Clarke pulls it into her lap before running her hands over the sacred symbol etched into the front and opening it carefully.

 

Inside, there are portrait drawings of people she doesn’t recognize and drawings of other people she does, like Anya and Gustus. Clarke looks at each of them carefully before moving on. She thumbs through documents written in a language she barely understands. She figures that she’s looking at some sort of Will and final wishes. She wonders if Lexa wrote them before she became _heda_ , before she lost everyone she loved. She wonders if that’s why they’re still in this leather binder.

 

She stops when she sees her own name written on the back of a large, thick folded piece of parchment.

 

Her eyes widen and glass over. Her hands run over the front of the worn paper and she takes a deep breath before unfolding it. She expects a letter, some last words, a goodbye, maybe, but the paper keeps unfolding and Clarke soon realizes what it really is.

 

It’s a map.

 

Clarke breathes out in disappointment and almost wants to rip the damn thing up but stops when she notices how it’s unlike any other map she’s seen since arriving on the ground.

 

It’s larger, more elaborate. It’s bigger and there are places on it that Clarke’s never heard anyone speak about before. It’s land that she knows isn’t inhabited by any known clan, land that grounders have told her was too damaged by the bombs for anyone to survive there. Clarke had been under the impression, had heard few stories, of people never returning from such places, but this map is detailed and in depth. And in the bottom right corner of that map, past the territories of other clans, and hundreds of miles more south, someone has written only one word.

 

_Seingeda_

Clarke translates it quickly.

 

Family.

 

She gasps.

 

She makes the decision then and there.

 

//

 

“There’s no way in hell,” her mother says when she visits her the next day. Clarke scoffs and takes a gulp of her liquid breakfast. Her mother grabs the flask from her hands and takes great pleasure in moving across the room to tip the contents away. Clarke rolls her eyes. She doesn’t look at her mother until she’s sitting in front of her. “Clarke, even if you were healthy, this journey would most likely _kill_ you.”

 

Clarke shakes her head regardless of the headache she has. “I’m doing it.”

 

“I won’t put our people through this,” Abby warns her. “They’ve been through enough.”

 

Clarke laughs mirthlessly and sighs. “I don’t want _help_ , Mom. I’m not looking for members to form a search party. I’m going by myself.” She pauses. “I need to do this by _myself_.”

 

When her mother desperately grabs her hand, it does nothing. When her mother urges her chin to turn her face, Clarke rolls her eyes again. She barely recognizes the hopelessness in her mother’s eyes.

 

“Clarke, you’re not strong enough to do this,” her mother whispers. “The trauma you sustained during the war has ruined your body. This will _kill_ you. You were hit with an arrow, poisoned, _shot_. You’ve had countless infections that I have no idea how you survived. Not to mention you’ve filled your body with _moonshine_ …”

 

Clarke is untouched by her words.

 

“I don’t care,” she whispers plainly. She has to do this. It’s her only chance. It’s the only way.

 

Her mother’s bottom lip trembles. “You haven’t slept in _weeks_ , Clarke.”

 

Clarke’s eyes burn at the thought of sleeping again and she shakes her head resolutely.

 

“I’m going, mom.”

 

She leaves without another word.

 

The sounds of her mother’s tears don’t make her turn back.

 

//

 

“You’re stupid,” Octavia whispers when she finds her, packing her bags and getting her supplies ready later that evening.

 

There’s a storm coming in the next day or two and if it weren’t for that, she’d probably be gone already.

 

Clarke ignores her words and watches how her indifference makes Octavia squirm in annoyance.

 

“Did you hear me, Clarke?” she says more loudly. “You’re a goddamn _idiot_.”

 

Clarke sighs and continues filling her pack. She’s removed about four things she probably needs all because she’s desperate to fit at least one jar of moonshine inside. All she really probably needs is that and her gun.

 

“I don’t see how this has anything to do with you,” she mutters as she takes a sip from the flask beside her. “Also, I’m just doing what everyone here wishes I’d done months ago and leaving. I’m just a burden anyway.”

 

“That’s because you’re a drunk fool,” Octavia spits. “Who would have thought that out of you and Bellamy, you’d be the one to become a joke? I thought _you_ of all people would want to make sure that those idiots on the council made a better go of it this time around.”

 

Clarke knocks about fourteen things over as she gets to her feet. “Your brother hasn’t spoken to me in months. Those idiots on the council are ruining _everything_. They pretend everything’s okay but this world was beautiful, Octavia. Indra would be so goddamn disappointed in you. She made you a leader but you’re just standing beside Bellamy and Kane and my mom and destroying everything alongside them.”

 

“It needs to be done,” Octavia tries but Clarke laughs in her face.

 

“The world was better off without us.”

 

Octavia laughs mirthlessly. “Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now. We’re here. We can’t go back.”

 

Clarke swallows thickly as she remembers all the things she wouldn’t get to see if they could. She thinks about all the things she’d miss. It doesn’t make sense that she’s lost them all already.

 

“I’m going, Octavia,” she whispers, stuffing more things into the pack. “Are you telling me that if you found a map that Lincoln had left for you, that you wouldn’t _run_ there? Are you telling me you wouldn’t be curious?”

 

Recognition sparks in Octavia’s eyes before she defiantly grits her jaw.

 

“Exactly,” Clarke smirks. “Now leave me alone.”

 

The door slams but Clarke doesn’t flinch.

 

//

 

No one understands what she’s doing. No one really cares either. They think it’s a fool’s errand. They believe it’s just another of her drunken quirks. Why else would she want to chase something left for her by the woman who betrayed her?

 

The storm prevents her from leaving for two days, only for her mother to convince her not to leave for another two, just in case. She keeps her in a room, close to her own, and has people that Clarke’s never met before bring her whatever she wants.

 

She asks only for moonshine, but they start bringing her things she doesn’t ask for.

 

It starts with food, meals as close to decadent as they can manage with their lack of still growing crops. Clarke doesn’t eat it and enjoys the way they come back surprised to not find an empty plate.

 

They bring her clothes and books and a chessboard that she rolls over at the sight of. It’s not until her mother has them bring her art supplies that it really annoys her. She picks them up and storms through the hallways until she finds her. Her mother purses her lips when Clarke slams them down on the desk in front of her and then stomps out.

 

She finds Clarke pacing in her room ten minutes later.

 

“Stop trying to make me stay!” Clarke spits when she sees her. “I’m going. I am going and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

 

Her mother steps closer and tries to reach for her. “Clarke, this is suicide. This is going to _kill_ you. Can you not see that? You’re going to do this and I’ll never see you again. It’ll kill you, Clarke!”

 

“And so what if it does?!” Clarke spits back around an almost maniacal laugh. “There’s nothing left here for me. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be a part of this world. Why does it matter?”

 

Her mother’s face shifts and changes into too many expressions at once for Clarke to understand what they are. When her shoulders drop and she clasps her hands together almost pleadingly, Clarke still doesn’t stop pacing. She hates being near these people and it’s driving her nuts.

 

“Clarke,” she tries softly. “I know what you’ve done haunts you. I know that you feel like you don’t deserve it, that you don’t deserve to move on, but you _can’t_ keep going on like this. It’s scaring me.” Clarke shakes her head at her mother’s words. “I know that, one day, you’ll find something or someone that will make you happy again. You just have to _try_. You don’t have to do this—”

 

“Yes, I do,” Clarke nods resolutely.

 

Her mother’s voice breaks. “Clarke—”

 

After all these months, it’s so easy to snap.

 

“Mom, I already found the person that made me happy, the thing that made me want to live.”

 

Her mother’s face changes into recognition. She opens her mouth to speak but Clarke shakes her head. Her mom thinks that she knows but she doesn’t. She doesn’t know anything.”

 

“Her name was Lexa,” Clarke says, her voice suddenly thick, breathy and broken. “And loving her is still the best thing I’ve ever done. She was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. I spent almost eighteen years dreaming of trees and flowers and oceans but I never anticipated _her_. The first time I saw her, I knew that I didn’t need to see anything else.”

 

Her mother takes a deep disappointed breath in and it makes Clarke feel worse.

 

“She kissed me and I knew that this world had nothing else to offer me. She convinced the entire world that she was brave and strong, but really she was delicate and _beautiful_. In my arms, she was fragile and small.” Clarke lets her jaw quiver only once as she speaks. She turns her sadness into whispers instead. “But she’s not here anymore. She died in my arms. I kissed her to sleep. I _loved_ her. I loved her and I never got to tell her.”

 

Her mother’s face changes and softens and the soft exhale she releases has Clarke fighting to keep a hold on herself.

 

“And the worst part is that… I think she loved me, too.” The words rattle from Clarke’s chest and she stares blankly at a spot on the wall above her mother’s head. “I think she loved me too, and the fact that I’ll never be able to know for sure… it’s driving me crazy. It’s killing me. So that’s why I have to do this. Because she wanted me to. Because there’s something out there that she wanted me to see.” Clarke sighs. “And if I die, it doesn’t matter. Maybe she’ll be waiting for me somewhere. Maybe I’ll get all the answers I need. Maybe—Maybe we’ll meet again.”

 

Clarke doesn’t know when her mother managed to move closer but she feels hands reaching for her face and her neck. It doesn’t feel nearly as soothing as it used to.

 

“Clarke,” her mom sighs. “Baby, it’ll get bett—”

 

Something churns inside of Clarke and she cuts her off quickly. “Don’t tell me it’ll get better,” she warns her breathlessly and her eyes find her mother’s sharply as she begins shaking her head. “There has not been one day since I lost her where things have felt _better_ ,” she spits bitterly. “Mom, I die a little bit more each day but it never ends. I need to do something. I need to do _this_. I need… closure? An ending? I don’t know. All I know is that, for a few moments, when I was lying next to her, it felt like I actually knew what peace was.”

 

Her mother smiles and her fingers stroke Clarke’s cheeks. Clarke frowns because she’s still not sure her mother understands.

 

“I felt it and it didn’t feel like _this_ , Mom,” she explains. “This isn’t peace. _She_ was peace and she wants me to do this.” Her mother sighs and lets go of her but Clarke grabs her and turns her back. “What if she has a family, mom? There’s nobody left here who loved her and knew her. Nobody but me. What if she has a family?”

 

Their hands tangle together easily and Clarke lets her gaze burn resolutely into her mother’s eyes. She knows that her mother will never truly stop her. She knows that her mother doesn’t have the power to. They’ve gone through this push and pull of power since they arrived on the ground and her mother knows that there’s nothing she can do.

 

“Promise me you’ll try,” her mother whispers brokenly. “Promise me that you’ll try to find happiness. If you can’t come back to us, at least try to be happy.”

 

Clarke’s smile doesn’t quite reach all the right parts of her face. It doesn’t feel right to make such a promise.

 

She does it anyway.

 

//

 

Her mother tells her that once the storm is over, the gates will open and she can leave.

 

The storm has been over for at least a day now but Clarke allows her mother to set her a timeframe. Twelve more hours, just to make sure it’s safe.

 

Twelve more hours with each other, just in case it’s the last they have.

 

Her mother needs this and she knows that when her mother comes into her bedroom later that night with a bottle of moonshine and a blanket. She settles in beside Clarke without a word and hands her the alcohol without a struggle. Clarke looks at it curiously and wonders if her mother’s been speaking to Murphy. They sit in silence for a long time and her mother doesn’t speak until Clarke quietly begins drinking.

 

“Are you sure you don’t want Murphy to go with you?” her mother whispers.

 

Clarke shakes her head. “He needs to fix things with Emori,” she murmurs. “He should stay here.”

 

“He understands you.”

 

Clarke laughs. “He does.”

 

“Why, Clarke?”

 

Clarke shrugs and caps the bottle before setting it aside. She decides to tell the truth. “It has nothing to do with shared bitterness and hatred for our people. I know that a lot of people think that. It’s because he was there.” Her mother turns to her curiously and Clarke plays with the makeshift label of the bottle. “He was there when Lexa died. He saw her. He saw _us_. I don’t know. I feel like… no one would ever get it if I tried to explain, but Murphy saw… so I didn’t need to.”

 

Her mother’s hand reaches to rest on her arm. “Could you try?”

 

Clarke looks at her quizzically.

 

Her mother looks away shyly. “Could you try to explain? Why you liked her?”

 

“Mom…”

 

The hand around her arm tightens. “I’m just curious, Clarke. I want to understand. I don’t understand why—”

 

“I loved her,” Clarke interjects around a laugh. “I loved her. I _still_ love her. I’m still so madly in love with her.”

 

Her mother’s expression says that she doesn’t understand why—or how—anyone could love Lexa that way. She looks at Clarke like she’s slightly crazy and it makes Clarke feel nothing but anger and disappointment all over again.

 

“No one knew her like I knew her,” she tries to explain, staring up at the ceiling. “She convinced people she was all these things but… she was just shy and scared. She wasn’t the Commander when we were alone. She was… just Lexa. No one knew Lexa.” She takes a moment to pause at the sadness that makes her feel. “I would catch her just staring at me _all the time_. Everything with her felt… completely unconditional. I knew that, if it came to it, she would do anything to keep me safe.” Clarke shrugs and smiles. “She just… wanted to keep me safe. And that’s how she made me feel.” She takes in a deep steadying breath. “It’s the worst feeling in the world, to know that I found the only thing that could make me feel truly safe—truly happy—and lost it too.”

 

Her mother’s thumb sweeps over her skin and Clarke fights away the stinging in her eyes and the ache in her cheeks. It’s been all these months. She will not cry now.

 

“I don’t think anyone will ever really understand,” she admits softly. “But I know that, whatever I had with her, it wasn’t enough. I always wanted more. I always expected more of her.” She shrugs. “Every time I fall asleep, I get to love her all over again. I get to imagine the things I’ll never have. But even that’s not enough. Not when I have to wake up and grieve her over and over. It’ll kill me first.” Her mother takes her hand and Clarke shakes her head as regret and guilt washes silently through her body. “I should have forgiven her sooner. Maybe then we’d have had more time. I thought we’d have more time.”

 

When her mother shuffles closer and kisses her temple, her cheek, her jaw, before settling in at her side, Clarke turns to her in confusion. She’s surprised to find tears running down her mother’s cheeks.

 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispers, wrapping herself around Clarke’s body.

 

Clarke frowns and clutches the arm across her stomach. “I didn’t think you’d understand…”

 

Her mother’s face falls and Clarke remains still and quiet as her mother repeatedly kisses her temple and nuzzles closer. She strokes Clarke’s dirty, messy blonde hair from her face before urging Clarke to look at her.

 

“Clarke, you lost the person you love,” she whispers. “There’s nothing I understand more than that…”

 

//

 

“Can you tell me things about her?” her mother asks much later, as they drift in and out of sleep. “Things that no one else knows?”

 

Clarke opens her mouth to speak but finds that there’s nothing she wants to say. She could tell her mother a million different things, a thousand different stories that could sway her opinion and instill her with reassurance. She could tell her how Lexa never pushed for forgiveness. She could tell her she was patient. She could tell her how Lexa left paper and charcoal at the end of her bed one morning while Clarke was eating breakfast and refused to admit it. She could try to explain the exact color of Lexa’s eyes. She could tell her that Lexa was smart and that she liked to read. That she was quick to make jokes when she could and smirked when she did. She could tell her how Lexa kissed her with disbelief and made love to her like she was made of glass.

 

She could tell her all those things but she doesn’t want to. She can’t. They’re hers and they’re the only part of Lexa that is solely hers. No one else has this and she thinks that sharing those memories is just another step closer to forgetting her.

 

“I can’t…” she whispers.

 

Her mother leans over and kisses her hairline instead. She strokes Clarke’s hair and hums a quiet song for a minute.

 

Clarke is relieved when she giggles and urges Clarke to turn over to face her.

 

“Did I ever tell you the story of how your dad and I met?” she says happily.

 

Clarke has heard this story a million times but she shakes her head anyway. There’s something soothing about listening to it. There’s something calming about her mother speaking about her father so fondly.

 

She falls asleep listening to her mother retelling the story of her first meeting with her father.

 

It’s the happiest she’s been in months.

 

//

 

She doesn’t expect anyone to be there waiting for her the next morning, but there’s a small, silent crowd gathered at the gates of the city when she quietly tries to leave.

 

She already said goodbye to her mother that morning, but she’s still stood there with the rest of them, strong and stone-faced and solemn. Clarke reaches for her hand first and squeezes it reassuringly. There’s nothing much else that she can say to console her at this point but she tries to anyway.

 

Raven hugs her quickly, Octavia too. Jasper kisses her cheek and shakes her hand. Bellamy looks as though he was dragged here against his will and offers her nothing more than a nod of acceptance. Kane puts a satchel around one of her shoulders while Jackson puts another over the other. They tell her it’s supplies and she takes them with a grateful smile, even though she knows they’ll be too heavy to carry for as long as she needs to go.

 

They all look at her like they want to say something but none of them do. She’s about to leave when someone shouts behind her. They all look and Clarke tries not to sigh too loudly in annoyance when Murphy appears wearing a pack and guiding two horses towards them.

 

“Murphy…” she starts warningly when he hands over the reigns of Clarke’s horse that isn’t really hers at all. It will always be someone else’s.

 

Murphy smiles and shakes his head. “I’ve been sent to the southern borders of _Trikru_ land on business,” he explains carefully. “Mind if I keep you company for a few days.”

 

The desperate looks in the eyes of everyone around her force her to nod in agreement.

 

Her only request: “No horses.”

 

//

 

They walk all day without speaking.

 

Murphy stops when she stops, drinks when she drinks, and watches silently as she hunts quietly for food. He looks grateful when she shares with him and it must be the sentimental part of her that wants to tell him that he has nothing to be grateful for. She owes him more than she ever thought she’d owe him. He’s protected her and cared for her in a way that didn’t drive her crazy. He’s let her cope and grieve in the way that she needed to. He gave her something to drink when everyone was telling her she needed to stop.

 

He still says nothing now when she chases her gulps of water with hits of moonshine. Instead, he lights a fire once it gets too dark and covers her in a blanket when she eventually blacks out. He stops her when she curses herself for sleeping in the next morning and hands her some of breakfast, overfilling the plate like he knows she would never feed herself like this otherwise. He covets away leftovers into his pack and then follows her in much the same way he did the day before.

 

“How long do you think it’ll take you to get there?” he asks towards the end of the second day, when the sky has started to turn dusky behind the trees and darkness starts to seep in again.

 

Clarke takes a drink and shrugs her shoulders. It’s been almost two days and she thinks they’ve probably only walked fifty miles at most with the amount of breaks that she’s been taking. The warnings her mother gave her about her weaker body shout in her ears but she knows she’d still be here anyway. Her injuries were vast and they were serious. She shouldn’t be alive. She shouldn’t be alive and that’s probably another of the reasons she’s doing this.

 

“A few more days? A couple of weeks?” she murmurs. “Who knows? I didn’t really set a time frame.”

 

Murphy looks at her and for a second she thinks she sees concern. He’s quiet for a long time before he looks up at her knowingly.

 

“How much booze you got left?”

 

It’s the first time he’s commented on her coping mechanism instead of just giving her more. Clarke swallows because, from him, it makes her feel nervous. She thinks about the flasks of drink rattling away in the bottom of her pack amongst the much fewer flasks of water.

 

“Enough,” she tells him eventually.

 

He looks at her blankly.

 

“You sure about that?” he says as he stokes the fire cooking their dinner. “Because by my estimation and looking at that map… you’ve got a good few hundred miles left to go before you even get close to your destination. And by my count… you don’t have barely enough to get you there.”

 

“What’s your point, Murphy?”

 

For the first time, he looks disappointed in her. “You’re practically a doctor, Clarke,” he reminds her. “You know better than to think you can drink as much as you have been and for nothing to happen once you stop. Do you really think you’re gonna get to where you need to go if you’re curled up in a ball going through withdrawal?”

 

She swallows thickly, bites the skin off her dry lips, before laughing mirthlessly. She takes a gulp from her flask in resistance and swallows it around the burn.

 

“Do you actually want to do this?” he says before she can spit some vitriol at him. “Or are you trying to kill yourself like they all think?” he asks. He stands up and wanders over to his pack before delving inside. When he pulls out a gun and waves it at her, she still manages to gasp in surprise. “Because there are better ways to do it than to leave your family wondering forever and I thought you were kinder than that.”

 

She stares down into the fire and thinks about it. She thinks about death and about what it would mean for her. It would be easy, she’s sure. It would be easy and it’s almost definitely a certainty in this journey whether she drinks herself to death during or not. She has no idea if there’s water or food going south. She has no idea if the air is suitable enough to breathe or if the oxygen will be so thin that she’ll asphyxiate before she even realizes. She has no idea what creatures live in the unknown, if there’s habitable land. And even if she does get to her destination and there’s nothing there, she has no idea if she’ll have enough energy or life left in her to find her way back.

 

But what else does life have left to offer her? A job building a new world she has no interest in being a part of? A purposeless life where she becomes nothing more than a footnote in history, a cautionary tale in order to save those trying to build a better future? She doesn’t think she can live the rest of her life watching generations point and whisper. She doesn’t think she can sit and wait for the day when people get brave and start asking questions.

 

She knows that she’ll never have a family of her own. She knows that there will never be a day where she doesn’t wake up and wish for her. She knows that no human being will ever compare.

 

Doing this is all she has left to offer. Lexa must have a family somewhere. There must still be people in the world who knew her and loved her and if Clarke can find those people, if she can find another human being who truly deserves to mourn and grieve the loss of her, then that’s more than purpose than she needs.

 

She couldn’t save her life. But she can do this.

 

She can say sorry.

 

“What do you suggest I do?” she spits at Murphy reluctantly before the tears come.

 

They still roll down her cheeks anyway. Nothing good ever comes from thinking about her.

 

She’s surprised when Murphy leans over and wipes her face for her.

 

“We’re gonna get you sober,” he says softly. “And then if you still feel up to it, I’ll let you get on your way.”

 

He cups her face, smiles at her, and offers her water.

 

She sighs in relief.

 

//

 

He pours away all the booze and then replaces it in the flasks with water from a nearby fresh stream.

 

He keeps on flask on him, just in case something bad happens.

 

They keep walking while he tries to wean her off the dependency. She soldiers on regardless of the symptoms that slowly take over her body. She feels nauseous and her stomach feels like it’s trying to break free from her body while her body shakes like it’s trying to let it. Her hands slowly start to shake so much that Murphy has to feed her the water she so desperately needs and the food she so desperately doesn’t want. He rubs her back when she vomits and holds her through the tremors of her body. He wipes away the liquid she sweats profusely. She doesn’t sleep so he doesn’t sleep with her. He fights with her when she tries to get to the last flask and is ruthless with how pathetic she becomes when he threatens to pour it away.

 

She can tell he’s scared when she can’t move and she pants so much that Clarke is sure she’s about to die. But Clarke is so confused that she has no idea where she is, or who Murphy even is, that she doesn’t care.

 

He still holds her through it all.

 

He tells her to shut up when she begs him to kill her.

 

She has no idea how long it’s been but she wakes up some time after with no real memory of what happened feeling weaker than she’s ever done before.

 

When she looks at Murphy, he’s repacking her things, filling it with fresh flasks of water from the never-ending stream they haven’t deviated away from in days. He hands her one of the flasks of water and a metal tin of breakfast with a firm instruction to finish both.

 

He looks exhausted but relieved and god only knows what she truly put him through.

 

“How long was I out?” she asks sheepishly.

 

He glances up at her as he puts the medical supplies Jackson gave her inside the pack carefully. “Almost four days.”

 

She frowns when she sees him packing his own things away, refilling his own water flasks and putting some of the supplies he brought with him into Clarke’s pack too. The words are out of her mouth before she really realizes what’s happening.

 

“You’re heading back,” she whispers.

 

His smile is kind but timid. “I promised your mom I’d get you sober within three days. It’s been over a week.”

 

He stands up and starts pacing. He looks like he’s going to cry and it makes her worried. When she tries to stand up, she stumbles and he’s at her side in a second. He clutches her around the biceps and squeezes warningly. She frowns when she finds his glassy eyes.

 

He shoves her lightly before he pulls her into his arms. “They ruined you, Clarke. They ruined everything and—You can’t waste this opportunity. You have an opportunity here and—” He stops and, when he pulls away and wipes his face, he shakes his head like he said something he shouldn’t. “Please keep safe,” he tells her and he’s gripping her face and kissing her forehead before she can understand what’s happening. “Please be happy.”

 

She watches in silence as he grabs his things. He’s almost disappeared from view when she thinks to call his name. He turns to her with tears on his cheeks.

 

“Thank you, John,” she says.

 

He chuckles and breaks off a nearby twig.

 

“You’re welcome, Clarke,” he whispers.

 

She doesn’t think to move until she hears the last of his footsteps disappear.

 

//

 

She misses his annoying whistling.

 

She misses him just being there. He’s been there for so long, watching over her, that it doesn’t feel right to be walking around without him. The nausea and vomiting still wracks her body and without the alcohol to stop her caring, she’s almost scared she might die from it.

 

She eats the provisions he gave her when she doesn’t have the energy to hunt and ends up sleeping even longer when she does. She shivers in her sleeping bag and is sure that she’s still hallucinating from the withdrawal as she tries to go to sleep. She’s not even sure that she does actually sleep. She imagines great creatures chasing after her and feels like her body is seeping into the mud beneath her body. Some nights she knows she stays awake with her hands over her ears and her face buried into her thighs when she’s sure the forest is trying to trick her.

 

She walks until her body feels like it’s going to fall apart and vomits against trees when she pushes herself too far. There’s five days, when she thinks she’s over half way of her journey, where it rains constantly throughout the day and night. The wind practically assaults her and knocks her into trees, whips branches and detriment into her face until the bloody scratches cover her body.

 

On one of the days, it becomes so bad that she doesn’t walk anywhere until the sun has set, risen and set again while she takes cover in a cave at the bottom of a mountain. She shivers herself into exhaustion anyway because it’s still too damp to make a fire and she has no kindling and her sleeping bag was already wet from the days before. It’s the first time she’s sure she’s not going to make it. It’s also the first time she pulls the half-finished drawing from the inside of the metal case since she first put it in there.

 

Exhaustion wins out eventually and she wakes up after what feels like minutes to see the sun shining through the opening of the cave. She exhausts herself removing the fallen trees from the opening of the cave and then has to stop when she cuts her hip on a particularly sharp branch and has to bandage herself up.

 

//

 

Her energy wanes as she moves further south, through mountain ranges and forests. She worries about what the heat the further south she moves means but through the haze of exhaustion, she manages to remember that this area once had a warm almost tropical climate.

 

She finds a small lake a couple of days later and revels in removing her dirty clothing, washing them through in the water, before floating on her back in the lake until the sun dries them out.

 

She manages to hunt a few small creatures and greedily eats them as she lies out under the stars with a small fire lit beside her. She feels like the only person on the planet and wonders what happened to the people who once populated this area. She hasn’t seen another human being in weeks but she supposes that isn’t a bad or surprising thing. She never really expected to, knowing that she’s way past what is documented on grounder maps and history.

 

It’s the first time she’s felt like she’s still on the earth in weeks. It reminds her of the time after they arrived on the drop ship and thought they were still alone. The earth feels like it has promise all over again and Clarke doesn’t feel stupid or angry as she starts to cry over all the things that happened after it. She quietly wipes her cheeks of the tears she spills and remembers all the good things that happened. She remembers all the people she found and all the things that she lost and feels happy that she’s still laying in the overgrown grass as she does so. She’s glad that this small patch of the earth hasn’t been ruined.

 

//

 

That feeling lasts only a few more hours when Clarke is rudely awoken from her half-slumber by the sudden downpour of torrential rain. Her fire hisses as the flames are extinguished and she quickly pulls on her clothes as it beats down upon her.

 

She screams in frustration as she gathers her things and runs through the darkness to find somewhere to take cover. She finds a thick brush of trees and hides beneath them until the sun comes up and she can see her compass. It doesn’t stop raining and she flinches with each crack of thunder and flash of lightning that comes her way. The waterproof sheeting Kane hid in the pack he gave her only goes so far and she sits shivering beneath a tree for too long until she decides that she can’t wait any longer.

 

Her entire body aches but she grits her teeth and walks, even as the rain soaks through to her skin. She can’t have that much longer to go as she finds the coast of the ocean and follows it south. The land becomes marshier and wetter and she’s sure that her feet are rotting inside of her boots as she walks through it all. There’s nothing she can do about it anyway. There’s nowhere she can dry off, as there’s nothing in the wetlands she finds, nothing but marshes and barely-there trees that sway warningly in the wind.

 

Clarke’s fine until she meets the area’s inhabitants.

 

She regrets thrashing through the marshland when she enters onto the banks of a river and sees their scale covered bodies pointing towards her. She pauses immediately and knows what they are. She’s seen them in books on the Ark and knows that they aren’t kind animals. There are three of them, all longer and wider than she is, teeth bared and bodies pointing towards her.

 

She withdraws the gun hitched to her thigh quickly but her exhaustion dulls her reflexes.

 

She feels it’s teeth and screams in shock and panic. One shot from her gun rings out but she knows it didn’t hit anything. She feels herself being dragged down the sandy banks into the river and stares the creature between the eyes as she empties two shots into it’s head before emptying the rest of the bullets in her gun into the brains of it’s friends.

 

Even through the barely-there light of dusk, she can see the abundance of her own blood dripping down her leg onto the sand beneath her. She drops the gun and pries the jaws of the creature from her body, regretting it when the bleeding gets worse. Her hands cover the wound as she pulls her bags from her body before searching for the medical kit. She finds thick bandages rolled inside and wraps them around the wound.

 

The blood seeps through and she struggles to get up, pulling her things until they’re against a tree and out of the rain. Weak hands press against the wound and she keeps wrapping the minimal bandages she has around it, trying to tie them as tightly as possible.

 

_This is it_ , she thinks. _All these weeks, all these miles and all this way to be killed by a goddamn reptile._

 

She shivers but she knows it isn’t because of the cold anymore. Her hands press against the wound stubbornly and she doesn’t know when she blacks out because of the pain but she knows she’s soaked to the skin and lost more blood than she probably wants to.

 

She wakes up to overwhelming heat beating down on her face and startles awake with a shout. For a moment, she doesn’t know where she is or what’s happening but then the pain registers and she looks down at her hands. They’re covered in blood but it’s dry and she checks around her to see if it’s safe before she removes the bandages and pulls off her clothing down to her underwear. The wounds are still bleeding a little but she manages to find the suture kit inside the pack and haphazardly ties off each of the small bite wounds before re-bandaging her leg with the last of her supplies.

 

She lights a fire and dries out her clothes, continues to apply pressure to her leg as it aches in pain. There’s no antiseptic in the medical pack and that’s probably because the only thing they had to use back in Polis was alcohol. She hates herself a little bit for that now and wishes there was something to help the pain. Her body sweats with the ache and she sits in that spot beneath the tree on that riverbank for an entire day before she realizes she’ll die there if she doesn’t get up.

 

She fashions a nearby stick of wood into some sort of crutch and abandons a lot of her supplies to lessen the weight she has left to carry. It doesn’t help much but she clambers her way back towards the coast now that the wind has dropped. She follows it slowly, feeling her body pale and weaken with each stumbled step that she takes. She drinks more water to make up for the hunting she can’t do. She has two more portions of rations left in her pack but she’s saving them just in case.

 

She collapses and blacks out more than once when she stops for a break, but she always wakes up.

 

She’s not sure if she wants to anymore.

 

There’s one night, when the smells from her skin and body make her wonder if this is even possible anymore. That night, she sits against a tree looking out into the sea, clutches at her gun in her lap and debates whether it’s fair to herself to think she can carry on doing this. She holds the gun to her head for an hour but can’t get the image of her mother’s face and her father’s smile from her memory enough to pull the trigger. She’s already disappointed so many people enough as it is, so she decides in that moment that she’ll die the way the universe wants her to.

 

She checks the last few bullets in the gun and lifts it to the sky before emptying the barrel.

 

She doubts she’ll wake up in the morning, anyway.

 

//

 

But she does and she cries for twenty minutes when she does before forcing herself to stand up and start walking again.

 

She whimpers with each step and wonders how much longer she has until she reaches the end. She wonders if the world will just keep going and she’ll never reach anything, no matter what the compass says. She knows that she’ll keep walking until she can’t anymore and it’s when she has that thought that she sees it.

 

A bridge.

 

Or what used to be one anyway.

 

She knows what bridge it is and she knows that she’s where she’s supposed to be. She’s gone past where she’s supposed to be in fact.

 

The spot where she stands is what she’s been walking towards for weeks.

 

And there’s nothing here.

 

She drops her bags and stumbles closer to the roadway that used to take people to the islands beyond it before the bombs fell. The concrete of it feels odd beneath her feet after walking on mud for so long and she struggles closer and closer until she reaches the edge and sees nothing. There are no islands, but Clarke knew that. They were gone when the bombs fell too. There’s nothing.

 

And as she falls to her knees at the edge of the earth, Clarke realizes that’s what this journey was.

 

Nothing.

 

Just a waste of time.

 

Just a waste of life.

 

//

 

She doesn’t even cry or scream or yell.

 

It’s like this discovery was the only permission her body needed before it finally gave up.

 

Her body crumples and she finds herself looking straight up at the bright blue sky and pretty white clouds.

 

After all the years living in the sky wishing to be on the earth, she’s glad she gets to die looking up from it.

 

Her eyes flutter closed and she feels her entire body relax.

 

_Finally,_ she thinks as her breathing shallows and the world around her goes black.

 

“Clarke!” someone yells and she smiles.

 

She feels her body being lifted into someone’s arms and hands disappearing into her hair.

 

“Clarke?” someone says panicked. “Clarke, open your eyes.”

 

She does as she’s told, reluctantly, curiously, and sighs in relief when she finds familiar green ones looking back at her.

 

“Clarke, stay with me,” she whispers desperately. “Stay with me, Clarke.”

 

_Thank god_ , Clarke thinks as soft hands sweep over her face. _Oh, thank god._

She blacks out before she can think anything else.

 


	2. Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“She fell from the sky and somehow managed to turn the entire world upside down as she did it,” she whispers. “Nothing has been the same since.”_

**The Taste of War and Heartache**

**Part 2**

_And Promise me this:_

_You’ll wait for me only_

_Scared of the lonely arms_

_Surface, far below these birds_

_And maybe, just maybe I’ll come home_

_\- “Promise” by Ben Howard_

//

 

Over the buzz in her ears, Lexa can hear someone calling her name over and over again but she’s unable to take notice of it.

 

She can’t.

 

Not when she holds the one person she’s been waiting for in her arms. Not when she notices the blood and the dirt and the detriment that coats her body. Not when she soon realizes that the life that she needs to protect is hanging on by a thread.

 

“Clarke?” she says again, her hands softly rubbing at the softness of her cheek in an attempt to stir her. It does nothing and she begins to panic. “Clarke! Clarke, open your eyes. Open your eyes, Clarke!”

 

“Lexa…” someone says and they sound doubtful but Lexa holds Clarke closer as her body trembles and shakes. “Lexa, she’s—”

 

“She’s going to be fine!” Lexa spits and she looks up into the calm eyes that stare back at her desperately. “Get the boat.”

 

Those around her look scandalized by the idea of taking a stranger back with them, but the blue eyes in front of her look at her in calm understanding. Clio’s hand wraps around the back of her head and scratches her hair consolingly before she reaches for Clarke’s body too. Her trained hands check over her silently before her brow furrows in concern and she gestures for the two men who had accompanied them to help her.

 

They look surprised as their original and only purpose was to find the source of the shots their watchman had heard last night.

 

But it makes sense now and Lexa shouts at the men in a language that people here don’t speak when they falter in carrying out her instructions. Clio repeats them carefully and they manage to get Clarke into the small fishing boat and back in Lexa’s arms without further issue. Lexa watches as Clio finds blankets and wraps them around Clarke’s wet body and murmurs to the men to get them back to the island as quickly as possible.

 

“She has a fever,” Clio tells her gravely and Lexa nods because Clarke’s skin is searing even though her clothes are wet and freezing. Trained hands sweep Clarke’s hair from her face and Clio inspects the cuts and scratches that cover her face. Lexa watches as she clicks her tongue at the injuries and then shouts further instructions to the men as she takes the pulse at Clarke’s wrist.

 

It can’t be more than twenty minutes but it feels like hours before they reach the shore.

 

Fitz and Elena are there to meet them and they both pause when they see the person in Lexa’s arms.

 

“ _Wanheda_ …” Fitz whispers to himself gently before he comes to and reaches forward to help. His large body takes Clarke into his arms as Clio instructs him to take her to the clinic.

 

Elena stays, watching Lexa softly.

 

“ _Heda_ ,” she whispers questioningly, reaching for her, desperate to give support and consolation.

 

Lexa shakes her head and shrugs off the still unwavering support.

 

“My name is Lexa, Elena,” she reminds her quickly as she begins to follow after them to clinic. “Now is not the time to forget that.”

 

//

 

When she reaches the clinic, Clio is inside with her assistants, their hands already starting to work on Clarke.

 

Lexa shouts when the assistants begin to remove Clarke’s clothes. She moves closer and shakes her head at them in warning, enough that Clio has to intervene.

 

“Lexa…” There is warning to her voice but Lexa shakes her head in refusal. Clio watches her carefully, trying to understand. “Let them do their work.”

 

Lexa shakes her head adamantly and extends her arms to protect Clarke’s body. Something in Clio’s expression changes at the action and, even though Lexa can tell she understands, she speaks anyway.

 

“I’ll do it,” she whispers. “I’ll help.”

 

With a nod from Clio, the assistants leave. Lexa removes her outer clothing and reaches for the aprons she knows Clio keeps amongst her medical supplies before wrapping one around her body and rolling up her sleeves. Clio begins to cut the clothing from Clarke’s body and Lexa swallows back her emotions when she realizes that the clothing is hers. Her hands falter when Clio hands it to her, her fingers toying with the stitching before she tosses it aside with the rest of Clarke’s belongings.

 

“These should be burned,” Clio mumbles as she removes Clarke’s riding trousers to reveal bandages wrapped around her thigh that are soaked with blood. The smell that comes from them is overwhelming but neither woman falters at it. Clio almost looks relieved to find them. “Well, that explains it,” she comments.

 

She doesn’t say anything when Lexa retrieves a blanket and covers Clarke’s body before she takes the scissors and begins removing Clarke’s underclothes beneath them. She just goes about attempting to take Clarke’s boots from her sore feet as she mutters about needing medicine and her blood pressure.

 

Lexa grimaces and notices that Clarke’s injuries are worse than many of those who have spent months war. Her body is ruined. There are wounds both old and new. Scars cover Clarke’s body that tell of scrapes and battles with death. There are also minor and not so minor injuries that appear to be new but are not healing as they should be. Her skin is marred by a history that Lexa is not aware of yet and she pauses when she sees it because so much appears to have happened in their time apart.

 

It fills her with guilt and a thirst for knowledge that she knows she will have to wait for. She wants to know how Clarke survived such injuries. She wants to know how she’s still here. In Polis, infections like the ones that Clio points out would often mean a painfully slow or sometimes mercifully quick death.

 

But here, they don’t and Lexa is quickly reminded of that as she watches the woman before her. Clio looks calm and collected and quietly murmurs to Lexa what treatment is required.

 

Lexa’s hand settles at her diaphragm as she remembers the things that Clio is capable of.

 

It does not seem right that they are also the things that had her banished here.

 

She feels ashamed that her people had wanted to execute Clio for the things she was able to do. They were miracles. They were magic.

 

Lexa has never been gladder that she failed to listen to them. Even more, she is grateful that, regardless of the unkindness the world has shown her, Clio is always willing to help those in need.

 

“It’s going to be a long fight,” she says and it is only then that Lexa realizes she has been little help at all as she stands there holding her stomach. “You should get some rest. I’m going to need to clean all these.”

 

Lexa looks up at her and shakes her head.

 

“I’m fine,” she says breathlessly.

 

Clio’s curious eyes study her. “Are you sure?” she asks. “It isn’t going to be pretty.”

 

Lexa reaches behind her for the stool against the wall and pulls it up beside the table and sits down. Her hand lifts and stutters over Clarke’s body before it settles against the edge of the table instead. Clio ignores the movement and bustles around collecting supplies and medical tools before she settles them on a small trolley beside her. She hisses when she removes the bandages from Clarke’s leg and instantly reaches for things on the table to help her.

 

For a moment, Lexa watches quietly as she works before turning and watching Clarke’s face instead. It doesn’t make sense that she looks so peaceful when she is obviously in so much pain. She’s thankful that Clarke’s body knows best. She’s glad that it allows her to rest. She’s grateful that she’s still breathing. That she didn’t give up.

 

Lexa wonders how long it took for Clarke to get here. She wonders how many days or weeks she walked to find her. She wonders how many days she was in pain before she reached them. She wonders if she knew what she was walking towards, what she knew about her journey. A cry wells up Lexa’s throat in a way that it hasn’t done in a long time. She swallows it down and her hand finds Clarke’s, glad to feel her blood and her heart beat thrumming through her veins when she touches it.

 

Her other hand pauses before it pushes dirty hair from Clarke’s face. She strokes the backs of her fingers over Clarke’s cheek and hates that she doesn’t stir.

 

There are so many things she wants to say to Clarke. There are so many thanks that she needs to give. Her throat works around the tears desperate to escape from her and silently wipes away the ones that betray her as they cling to her chin.

 

“Do you want to help me clean the cuts on her face?” Clio asks and Lexa looks up to find her holding out a basin and a handful of gauze. Lexa takes them before moving her stool closer. She pushes the hair from her face and settles her head more comfortably on the pillow before she wets the gauze in the basin.

 

Lexa is gentle as she wipes the gauze over Clarke’s face and feels the tears again as she starts to reveal the familiar face beneath the blood and grime that coats her cheeks. She is unsurprised to see her face is sunken in with weight loss, her body scrawny and delicate after her journey. Lexa takes her time and it takes her much too long to realize that she has simply been caressing Clarke’s face with the gauze when Clio calls her name again.

 

“Want to help me with her feet?” she asks. Lexa nods.

 

//

 

It takes them a long time to clean and soothe Clarke’s feet. There are wounds all over them. Blisters atop blisters like those that would ail the bodies of the people of the mountain when they came outside into the air. Clio removes debris and dead skin from her feet before wrapping them in ointment and bandages.

 

“There’s still work to do,” Clio whispers to her, squeezing her hand as they stand and stare at Clarke’s body. “There are still things that I need to check. Wounds that might still require my help. But she’s been through enough and the light is leaving us. I need dinner and rest. You should have some too.”

 

Lexa shakes her head and Clio looks at her like that is exactly what she was expecting. She wraps an arm around her quickly before kissing Lexa fondly on her temple. The familiarity of it puts Lexa at ease. Clio is the only person who has repeated that action throughout her life, regardless of her title. Clio would kiss the commander in the same way as she kisses Lexa now. She used to kiss the young _natblida_ with the world on her shoulders in the same way too.

 

“May I find her some socks?” she asks as Clio watches her watch Clarke. Clio frowns in confusion and Lexa wraps her arms comfortingly around herself. Her bottom lip quivers shamefully and she bites the action away before speaking. “She does not enjoy having cold feet.”

 

Clio continues watching her but doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t ask Lexa how she knows such things. She doesn’t ask Lexa to recall how Clarke would sit in her bedchambers and tuck her feet under the furs, or how, for those brief hours they laid together, Clarke kept putting her cold feet against Lexa’s warm shins, just to see her reaction.

 

“I’ll find her some,” Clio whispers before kissing her temple again, and there is a reverence in her expression that tells Lexa she doesn’t need to be told those things anyway. She already knows them just from the expression on Lexa’s face. “And more blankets too.”

 

Lexa smiles gratefully and watches her leave without another word. She comes back a few moments later with some thick wool socks and armfuls of blankets that Lexa quietly helps her to cover Clarke with before she leaves again.

 

Lexa settles on the stool at the foot of the bed and takes Clarke’s feet carefully in her grasp. She reaches for her toes and feels how cool they are against her hands. She runs her fingers from Clarke’s ankles to the top of her soles and hates that the tears spike up her throat again. Without an audience, they escape more freely and Lexa doesn’t think before she leans forward and muffles them against the soft bandages atop Clarke’s feet. She whimpers against them momentarily before leaning back and admiring the wet patches she leaves behind.

 

Pressing a kiss to each damp spot is thoughtless.

 

It’s the least intimate thing she wants to do, but she cannot do anything else yet.

 

Not without permission.

 

So she covers her cold feet with warm socks and silently guards her while she sleeps instead.

 

//

 

Some of Clio’s assistants bring oil lamps to aid the muted overhead lighting of the room a short while later, after the darkness starts to make the lines of the world softer.

 

They clean the mess left behind by their master, scurrying it away to be cleaned and ready for reuse, and set out new supplies ready for when they’re needed. They try to be as quick and polite as possible but it doesn’t really matter.

 

Lexa pays no attention. She’s too busy listening to the gentle rattle of Clarke’s breath through her body. Her chest rises and falls steadily and surely, despite the stillness of the rest of her body and it’s reassuring.

 

It is somehow the quietest and loudest thing in the room.

 

It surprises her when Clio returns a while later and puts on a fresh apron to restart her work. She stands by Clarke’s beside and looks at her for a long time before saying anything. When she does, she tells her assistants to leave and looks to Lexa for permission when she reaches for the bed covers.

 

Lexa shakes her head and stands to rearrange the blankets for her. “I’ll do it,” she whispers, glad when Clio has the decency and understanding to turn around until she is finished. She hates how this woman knows her better than almost anyone else on Earth. “I thought you were going to rest?”

 

Clio turns back at the question and begins inspecting the cuts and bruises on Clarke’s stomach and hips. She quickly becomes swept up by her work and for a while, Lexa thinks that she is ignoring her.

 

Then Clio stands, shrugs and smiles at her kindly.

 

“I thought about it but then I realized that you would refuse to rest until you knew she’d been taken care of.” She reaches for the saline and more gauze before pointedly looking at Lexa. “You forget that you’re still my patient, too, and I will not allow you to do anything that might hurt you. You’re still recovering, Lexa.”

 

Lexa shakes her head and takes some of the gauze to help with the cleaning. “It has been many months,” she says. “I am fine.”

 

Clio’s expression is smug when she looks at her. “You are not being honest.”

 

Lexa stares down at the muddied fabric in her hands.

 

“When Clarke is fine,” she whispers. “I will be fine.”

 

Clio is bold enough to look annoyed at her. “And what if she’s not?”

 

Lexa cannot bear to think about such things at this time. She lets her eyes flutter closed and bites the dry, dehydrated skin on her bottom lip. She is thirsty but not thirsty enough to leave. She is not thirsty enough to stomach anything. Her body and brain are too full of curious thoughts.

 

“You are a fool, Lexa,” Clio murmurs when she doesn’t respond.

 

Lexa is unsure if she would disagree.

 

//

 

They work through the night until the darkest and coldest hours whistle in, aided only by the slew of Clio’s assistants that bring pots of tea and flasks of fresh water to hydrate and warm their bodies.

 

When they are finished, Clio follows Lexa outside and watches her when she takes in deep, relieved lungfuls of the fresh morning air. There is no part of her that doesn’t ache and beg for rest but she refuses to give into it. She slumps onto the dry dirt in the doorway and rests her elbows on her knees as she swipes clean wrists over her face.

 

Clio drops beside her quietly and they both silently stare at the sun as it rises.

 

They don’t move until Elena arrives with a tray full of sustenance for them both.

 

“Breakfast,” she says plainly. “For you, and Clio… and _Wanheda_ , too…?”

 

Lexa stares down into her lap and is grateful for Clio’s comforting hand to her shoulder.

 

“ _Wanheda_ sleeps,” Clio explains to Elena as she grabs fresh bread and tears a piece off. “If all goes well, she’ll probably be sleeping for a few days yet.”

 

Elena looks from Clio to Lexa.

 

“You should rest, _Heda_ ,” she says. When Lexa looks up at her, she appears uncomfortable before correcting herself. “Lexa.”

 

Lexa smiles fondly but shakes her head at Elena’s words. She ignores the food in front of her in favor of a hot cup of fresh tea. She holds it in her cold hands and enjoys the way the steam makes her feel better.

 

It gives her an idea.

 

“No rest,” she murmurs gently, staring down into the tendrils that warm her cheeks. “But I do have a job for you, if you wish for it.”

 

Elena says the same thing she said all those many moons ago when Lexa asked her to do something far beyond what her duty required.

 

“Anything.”

 

//

 

Fitz drags in the tin bathtub and settles it beneath Clarke’s head at the top of the table as Elena brings her the warm water and provisions that she asked for.

 

Clio stands in the doorway with a warm cup of tea in her hands, watching her with a curious smile.

 

“This is unnecessary,” she says softly. “There will be many more procedures. More of her blood will spill in order for her to heal. There do not appear to be any life threatening infections evident but that is something that could quickly change and, if it does, she may not even survive them.” Lexa shoots her a look and she sobers quickly. “My assistants can clean the rest of what has been spilled from her body. They are used to the smell. They’ve cared for the elderly enough.”

 

Lexa grimaces at her bluntness and shakes her head. “The bandages about her thigh are soiled. They need to be cleaned.”

 

Clio sighs. “But you do not need to clean them,” she says quietly. “This is not work for someone like you.”

 

Lexa thinks that nursing this woman back to health, even administering the harshest care and completing the most unfavorable tasks, will be the best and most meaningful work she will ever do. She takes the sponge that Elena hands her and enjoys the softness of it against her skin.

 

“It will make her more comfortable,” she explains to Clio’s quizzical brow. “It will help her fever and it will keep her warm. It will prevent further infections if she is clean. It is no bother.”

 

“Lexa—” She tries but Lexa quickly finds her feet.

 

“No one else will touch her,” she says carefully and swallows back the bile that threatens to rise unexplainably up her throat. “None of us know what she has been through,” she explains. “But I know that whatever it was, it is the reason that we still exist on this earth. She does not deserve to be touched by a stranger when she is not aware of it.”

 

Clio’s face falls curiously as she steps closer. Lexa ignores it and settles on the stool again.

 

“I will make sure that she is clean and comfortable,” she continues in a harsh whisper. “I will sit by her bedside until she knows that she is safe. I will make sure that she is safe here.”

 

Clio watches her for a long time. Lexa dreads to think of what she is wondering, what she might ask, but instead Clio nods her head and gives a brief bow before she leaves.

 

“Yes, _Heda,_ ” she whispers.

 

It’s the first time that Clio has called her that in a long time.

 

It should make her feel bad, but it doesn’t.

 

It is what is required.

 

//

 

Elena is the last to leave. She offers to stay but Lexa doesn’t need her help and ushers her out. She closes the drapes at the windows and closes the door behind her and Lexa stands there for a long while before she completes her task.

 

She starts by removing all the soiled linens and tossing them into the large bucket that Elena had set in the corner. She removes the blankets and the dirty bandages, too, making sure that the clean ones are still where Clio’s assistants had left them on the counter.

 

Lexa has seen many naked bodies. Her life and her career have made her almost immune to the sight of others undressed and laid bare. She was young the first time she laid with and touched another human being. It was overwhelming then, but it was nowhere near as overwhelming as it was to admire Clarke’s body that first time. It is overwhelming now, but in new ways. Clarke is broken and she is dirty and it makes Lexa ache to think that she is not the same as she was that afternoon they spent together.

 

It makes her ache even more that, even like this, she still thinks that Clarke is perfect.

 

Elena had provided her with gentle soaps to ensure that Clarke would not become irritated and sore. They smell just like those that would have been provided to her back in Polis. Fresh and clean. She soaks the sponge in the hot enough water, lets it drip all the way down to her rolled shirt sleeves, before she gathers the courage to touch it to Clarke’s skin.

 

Clarke is still too warm but Lexa knows this will help. She soaks and cleans the front of Clarke’s body until only the wounds are left behind to mar her skin. She supports Clarke’s body with blankets and the rickety metal side of the medical table and manages to roll her onto her side so that she can clean her back where blood still cakes to the skin on the bottoms of her legs and the curve of her hips. Lexa sighs as she soothes the skin over Clarke’s spine, follows it up until she feels a scar at the top of Clarke’s neck.

 

It gives her pause. Shocks her. It feels familiar, but not on Clarke’s body.

 

She was aware that such a thing was likely to happen. She had been warned about it.

 

She had been reluctant but had been assured by her predecessors that it was necessary. She pulls the stool closer to the bed, avoiding the bathtubs and buckets that surround her. She sweeps the hair from Clarke’s neck and takes an unsteady breath when she sees the same swooping symbol on Clarke’s neck that once lay perfectly over her own.

 

Her own is ruined now, destroyed by the reopened white scar that separates it.

 

Lexa allows her fingers to gently press against the flesh, searching for the familiar lump that once lay beneath her own skin, but it isn’t there. It can’t have been in there for long.

 

_Long enough_ , something inside of her whispers.

 

But Lexa looks at the blood red stains that coat her arms and her shirt and wonders how Clarke survived it. She does not ponder those thoughts long. They are questions for a different day.

 

Instead, she resettles herself on the stool and pulls Clarke’s body flat to the table. She sits by her head and then urges her body until her hair hangs over the edge. The jug that Elena provided her with sits on Clio’s worktable and she dips it inside the warm water before slowly pouring it through Clarke’s hair.

 

The dirt and blood washes from it easily, returning it back to that yellow gold Lexa is familiar with. Her lap becomes wet and her hands are sore but Lexa scrubs the hair gently with the soap Elena had given her, washing it until she’s sure it is clean. Clarke still doesn’t stir as she towels it dry many moments later, after she’s covered Clarke’s body with blankets and urged Fitz to remove the tubs of dirty water.

 

Elena interrupts her a few moments later with a knock on the door, bearing clean socks and a soft white nightshirt for Clarke to wear. She offers to help and leaves kindly when Lexa declines, only coming back once Lexa has dressed and re-bandaged her body.

 

She finds her, making braids in the straggly front of Clarke’s hair, pulling them into the back to keep it from her face.

 

“I can do that,” she says as she holds clean bedding in her arms. “If you wish to rest.”

 

Lexa shakes her head, glad to feel the soft strands beneath her fingers again.

 

“We will get her into a fresh bed and I will see her settled,” she says softly. “Then maybe I will rest once I’m sure she is comfortable.”

 

Elena smiles knowingly and moves past her into the bedroom beyond.

 

//

 

The only rest she finds is that which can be experienced through sitting in the old, worn armchair that sits beside the large bed in the center of the room.

 

It is the same bed that Lexa found herself in many months ago and she is glad to know of the comfort it brings. She curls into herself and watches as Clarke rests. Washed and in clean clothing, she finally looks peaceful enough to put Lexa at ease.

 

She’s sure that the reason that Elena and the assistants keep coming in to check on her is because Clio told them to. They bring her food and drink and blankets. She struggles to consume the sustenance and would rather give the blankets to Clarke.

 

Elena brings her fresh clothing and doesn’t let her argue when she leads her into the washroom to change into them. There is a basin set up with warm water and the same soap she had used for Clarke. Elena comfortingly squeezes her shoulder and tells her that she will watch over _Wanheda_ until she is better herself. Lexa agrees, if only because of the soft, warm comfort the clean clothing brings.

 

She’s sure her eyes flutter closed at some point, but it doesn’t last long. The sun rises high in the sky and it sets again and people come and go to check on both of them but Lexa doesn’t move, not unless her body forces her to.

 

The others come and sit with them throughout the day but she pays them no attention. They say nothing but Lexa has no conversation to offer them in return. Her heavy eyes never leave Clarke, always making sure that her chest rises and falls, that she’s comfortable and safe. When the dark rolls in, bringing the chill with it, she closes the windows and shutters and tucks the blankets further under Clarke’s chin.

 

When Clarke starts shivering in the middle of the night and her body starts burning up, Lexa’s unsurprised to find Fitz and Elena sitting guard by the front door. Lexa sends Fitz to find Clio while Elena fetches a cool washcloth for Lexa to mop against Clarke’s forehead until she arrives.

 

She brings her assistants with her and she murmurs instructions at them until they find her what she needs. They bring in medical equipment and bustle around Clarke so fast that Lexa can’t see what they’re doing. All she knows is that, when Clio is done, there is a tube in the back of Clarke’s hand that leads to a glass bottle of liquid.

 

“She’s dehydrated,” Clio tells her, mopping at her brow with her wrist. She wears gloves on her hands and another clean apron. “She needs to wake.”

 

Fitz and Elena and the assistants leave the room. Clio rests in the chair by the bed as Lexa stands at the foot of it, exhausted already.

 

“ _Will_ she wake?” Lexa asks quietly. It is the same thing that she’s been quietly wondering since she first saw Clarke’s weary body. She knows that Clio will not accuse her of giving up for asking.

 

As usual, she is clearheaded and honest. “There is nothing stopping her from waking but her own exhaustion. I see no brain injury. No serious infection appears to be present. She is lucky. Her body appears to only want rest. However, there are other things she needs while she does so. The intravenous fluids will help her to stay well.”

 

Lexa nods, relieved. She carefully settles at the foot of the bed and doesn’t think when she rests her hand atop Clarke’s bandaged foot. She knows that Clio cannot see it from where she sits.

 

“You just have to be patient,” Clio goes on. “She will wake when she’s ready.”

 

She gets up to leave and opens the shutters to see that the sky is starting to lighten outside. Her hands rest on her hips and she sighs.

 

“I’ll be back in a few hours to check her injuries,” she murmurs. She peels the gloves from her hands and throws them into a basin on the table in the corner. “I need to check the stitches in her leg and there are some wounds there that I was unsure would require suturing. I need to see if they are still bleeding.”

 

Lexa watches her remove her apron and loiter momentarily in the doorway into the treatment room. Clio looks tired and overwhelmed. She looks like she wants to ask more questions than she knows she should. She looks like she hates the fact that Lexa won’t answer them regardless.

 

“You didn’t have to do this,” Lexa whispers. “Thank you.”

 

Clio turns to her shocked and confused. Her eyes soften and she steps back over to the bed. Her hand finds Lexa’s cheek and she strokes there quickly before letting go.

 

“You know I’d do anything for you,” she sighs tiredly. There’s no emotion in her voice, just knowledge.

 

She kisses Lexa’s forehead before she leaves.

 

//

 

Lexa spends the next few hours helping Clarke through the chills of her fever.

 

She’s still shaking when Clio comes back and returns her to the treatment room. She doesn’t stop shivering, not even when Lexa strips her body and makes her clean again. She doesn’t stop shivering, even as Clio has to put more sutures in her body to stop her wounds from reopening.

 

They eventually move her back to the bed and Lexa spends hours leant over her body, mopping the sweat from her face and pushing the damp strands of hair from her skin. Her body is exhausted but she doesn’t care. Elena and Clio look at her in concern but she ignores them. They ask her to sit. They ask her to rest. She doesn’t do either and instead she sits there until it becomes dark again. And in the middle of the night, when the shivering becomes thrashing quakes of her body, Lexa just quietly calls Elena to fetch Clio as she tries to soothe Clarke in the only way she can think of.

 

When Clio and Elena find her, one hand is stroking Clarke’s hair while the other rests protectively against Clarke’s neck to feel her pulse. Her mouth rests against Clarke’s forehead as she makes thoughtless promises and hums the songs her mother would sing to her when she was unable to sleep. It does nothing to aid Clarke’s fever but it makes Lexa feel better.

 

Clio doesn’t say anything to her as she sits at the edge of the bed. She just dismisses Elena and the assistants that have followed her and takes Clarke’s wrist to feel her pulse. She politely ignores the quiet tears that roll down Lexa’s cheeks and carries out her work instead, even when Lexa has to pull back when Clio checks Clarke’s pupils and presses her hand to her forehead to feel her temperature.

 

“It _has_ to get worse in order for it to get better,” is all she says before she quietly leaves.

 

Lexa cannot help the muffled sobs that leave her once she has gone. She lets them soak into the linens by Clarke’s face and cannot let her hands leave her body. She hears someone snap at someone else to leave them be and knows that Clio is probably, knowingly standing guard by the door.

 

Lexa’s knees ache where they rest against the hard wood of the floor but she refuses to get up. She knows that this bed—this woman—is the only alter that she will ever worship and pray at. Her hands quiver as they continue to stroke Clarke’s hair back from her forehead, the other moving gently from her neck to her cheek to cradle it softly.

 

Her mouth nuzzles against Clarke’s ear and she sighs there sadly.

 

“You cannot go,” she whispers. “You _must_ wake up. This is not the end.” Her breath chokes from within her. “You came all this way. You made it all this way.”

 

Without meaning to, her lips litter kisses over Clarke’s forehead and her cheeks.

 

_Just for tonight_ , she thinks as she lifts her body from the floor and lets it rest on the bed beside Clarke’s. Her head settles against the pillow beside Clarke’s and she never lets her hand leave the softness of Clarke’s cheek.

 

_Just for tonight_ , she thinks. _Just in case._

//

 

She startles awake many hours later and is glad to see that no one has found her yet.

 

It must be late because the sun feels warm behind the shutters but that is the least of her concerns because she quickly realizes that Clarke’s shivers have stopped.

 

The skin where Lexa’s hand rests against her shoulder feels cool and damp from leftover sweat and when Lexa quickly presses her hand to her forehead she almost cries with relief.

 

Her fever has broken.

 

Clarke sleeps peacefully, chest rising and falling with each gentle and steady breath.

 

Lexa laughs in relief and gets up when she hears voices outside. She exits the clinic and finds Clio and Elena skulking around like they’ve been waiting for her to do so. Their eyes find her quickly and look concerned when she smiles.

 

“Her fever has broken,” Lexa whispers.

 

Clio sweeps past her and into the bedroom. Lexa stays and feels the sun on her face as she waits the confirmation. Clio laughs and it’s all Lexa needs to collapse and sit in the dirt again.

 

“She will wake up soon,” Clio says as she exits.

 

Lexa is too busy thanking the universe.

 

//

 

Clarke continues to sleep and Lexa allows Elena to set up a cot beside her bed for Lexa to rest in.

 

She is even talked into having dinner the next night but only because Clio sets up a table outside the front door of the clinic so that Lexa is able to see inside. They break bread and Lexa picks at the plate of chicken in front of her. Clio drinks wine and pours Lexa some too.

 

“Tell me about her,” Clio says when it is late and the others have disappeared to bed.

 

With one hand, Lexa holds a hot cup of tea to warm her hands while the other rests against the scar on her stomach. “She is an old friend.”

 

Clio laughs, deep and echoing from within herself.

 

“Do not offend me, Lexa,” she murmurs and takes a sip of her wine at Lexa’s confused look. She swirls the liquid in the glass and stares out over the ocean view beyond them. “I’ve seen the way you look at her. I saw the pain and relief in your face when we found her. I would be a fool to not notice the worry that aches in your bones as you care for her. I have heard the whispered promises you make to her when you believe nobody is listening, the prayers you make to gods that you know don’t exist.” She smiles kindly and solemnly. “They are not things we do for old friends. Old loves, maybe—”

 

“Hold your tongue,” Lexa spits, a version of herself long since seen escaping from within her uncontrollably.

 

Clio is untouched by the outburst. She leans back in her chair and sighs.

 

“Or what, _Heda_?” she demands lowly. “You forget I have known you since you were no bigger than a shoot growing from the ground. That I was there to help deliver you into this world, Lexa.”

 

Lexa stares at her in an attempt to intimidate her but Clio just stares back unaffected.

 

“I am the only family you have,” Clio reminds her sadly. “I ask you these questions, not because I want to know the answers, but because I want you to be free of their burden.” She shakes her head and tosses the remnants of her wine into the dirt. “You have always had such a quizzical brow, a quietness and a reluctance to talk about the things that plague you. I am aware that this is because, with others, you were worried of their intentions and loyalty but I am your _family_ , Lexa. You do not need to tell me that you love her. I already _know_ that you love her.”

 

Lexa turns to her sharply and cannot help the burn that rises to her cheeks. Clio is still ruthlessly and knowingly unaffected by it all.

 

“You loved her enough to betray your people,” Clio goes on bluntly and Lexa struggles to swallow the sudden rush of shame that comes over her. “You loved her enough to allow the guilt of that to make you lose yourself. I just want to know how these things have made you feel.” Briefly, her expression falters and she softens before she speaks again. “Out of all the burdens you have had put upon your life, I feel like this might just be the largest one.”

 

Lexa sets her jaw and tries not to cry. When Clio reaches over to quietly hold her hand, it becomes harder. She bites her lip and nothing is said as the tears roll down her cheeks.

 

These are the things that she has avoided mentioning. These are the details of her story that she didn’t dare admit to. She has spent all these months with these people, with them knowing what she did, that she had to do it, but not knowing the reason why. None of them ever questioned her. She told them it was for their own good and she was right. The truth had been hard to handle. The solution had been even harder. She took a risk and it could have all gone wrong but it didn’t.

 

The solution is resting in the bed behind them, making everything real again.

 

“She saved us all,” Lexa breathes like that serves as meaning enough. “She is the reason we are still here.”

 

Clio nods but she still frowns because it isn’t enough.

 

“I know. You told us,” she says plainly. “But that is not what I’m asking.”

 

Lexa looks away and stares into the bedroom where Clarke sleeps peacefully.

 

“I do not know what you want me to say,” she begins reluctantly. Clio just looks at her patiently, like she might wait forever if she has to. Lexa sighs reluctantly and straightens her back. She wipes her cheeks and shrugs. “She is unlike anyone I have ever met. She is stubborn and impatient and has no respect for leadership or authority, especially if they are making rash and idiotic decisions. She is determined and honest.”

 

She swipes at her cheeks as speaking the words aloud makes her more aware of how much they mean. A small smile befalls her lips.

 

“She fell from the sky and somehow managed to turn the entire world upside down as she did it,” she whispers. “Nothing has been the same since.”

 

Lexa glances over to where she can barely see Clarke in the bedroom and takes a deep, heavy breath.

 

“She is special,” Clio says and Lexa looks over to her, too used to those words escaping her own lips instead of someone else’s. “But none of these things tell me how she managed to steal your heart. The Lexa I remember liked obedience and order. She would never have stood for the nonsense it appears this Clarke likes to initiate.”

 

Lexa looks into the dregs of her teacup. “It is not disobedience,” she insists gently. “Clarke challenges me. She makes me see new ways of doing things. Better ways.” Her eyes narrow and anyone would think she was studying the tealeaves for answers. “People believe that Clarke’s ways have ruined the world but… they have made it better. She is the only one who could have saved us. I knew that before my predecessors told me she would.”

 

Clio laughs and then reaches over to pour herself more wine.

 

“You are no good at this game,” she grumbles and Lexa can tell that the conversation is finished.

 

Lexa smiles triumphantly. “Well then, what would you wish I tell you?” she asks. “What is it that you want to know? That she stole my heart without me knowing it? That she made me realize that my life meant more than what everyone else had ever led me to believe?”

 

Clio gets up with a sigh and grabs the bottle of wine before looking down at her.

 

“You didn’t need to tell me that,” she informs her. “That information is written all over your face when you look at her.”

 

Lexa’s expression falls.

 

“It’s also written between every line you speak,” she smiles and begins to leave but not before she turns back impishly. “But it would have been nice, to hear the stories…”

 

Lexa blinks slowly.

 

She thinks about telling their story, of the adventures and trials that they endured.

 

It is a relief that it is not over yet.

 

As she moves to sit back beside Clarke’s bedside, she is glad for that.

 

//

 

Lexa’s back aches from sleeping on the cot.

 

Clio rolls her eyes as she sees her rubbing at the sore muscles the next morning. She moves over to help once she’s finished taking Clarke’s pulse and blood pressure and maneuvers Lexa’s body to alleviate the pain. She manages to work out the knot quicker than Lexa would ever be able by herself.

 

“There is no reason for you to still be in here,” Clio says disapprovingly once Lexa has hissed her way through the pain. “You do not need to watch over her. You can sleep in one of the other bedrooms next door.”

 

Lexa chuckles mirthlessly. “You are unaware of how skittish Clarke can be when she wakes up.”

 

When Clio says nothing more, Lexa sighs and turns to her.

 

“I just want her to know that I am here.”

 

Clio smirks and gives her shoulder one last squeeze as she gathers her things back into the treatment room.

 

“She has made you soft,” she states as she sweeps out the door.

 

Lexa smiles and settles in her chair beside Clarke’s bed. She cannot help it when she lifts Clarke’s hand and presses a gentle kiss to her palm before letting it rest against her own cheek. The skin is cool but no longer damp with her fever. If she closes her eyes, she can briefly imagine that they are somewhere else. Somewhere happier.

 

“I was soft already,” she whispers before she presses her lips to Clarke’s fingertips.

 

Clarke does not stir. Lexa is momentarily glad for it.

 

//

 

It is not until the following afternoon that Clarke does begin to wake.

 

She is recently cleaned, her wounds checked, and her sheets and bandages changed.

 

Lexa is settled beside her eating the soup Elena brought her when Clarke’s legs suddenly jerk beneath the linens. The three women in the room freeze in shock and wait for it to happen again. Lexa thrusts her bowl into Elena’s hands and quickly kneels beside the bed at Clarke’s side when her body continues to shift.

 

“Clarke?” Lexa whispers carefully. She does not stir. “Clarke?”

 

Clio rests her hand on Clarke’s forehead, calls her name too, and is answered when Clarke quickly slumps over onto her other side away from them. Clio laughs, mumbles something under her breath as Elena squeezes comfortingly at Lexa’s shoulders.

 

“Is she alright?” Lexa whispers. She cannot find it in her to blush or feel shy when she reaches to brush the hair back from Clarke’s face in front of the pair of them. It is the least of her concerns.

 

Clio rolls her eyes. “She is fine,” she says. “She will wake soon.”

 

Lexa cannot help the smile that fights onto her face.

 

//

 

She does not leave the room for anything.

 

Everything else can wait.

 

It does not matter when, but a few hours later, Clarke’s eyes slowly flutter open.

 

She looks delirious.

 

Lexa pushes the hair back from her face again and soon finds exhausted blue eyes turning to where she still kneels over her. Her eyes blink slowly for many long moments, her face expressionless as she takes in the person before her.

 

“I’m dreaming…” she murmurs around a dry, unused voice.

 

Lexa shakes her head and smiles. “No, Clarke.”

 

Clarke takes in a deep, strenuous breath, like just doing that is exhausting for her tired body. She blinks slowly up at Lexa, accepts the drips of water from the washcloth against her lips.

 

“I’m tired,” she breathes.

 

Lexa nods and watches as her eyes flutter warningly. “Then you must sleep.”

 

It is seconds before Clarke is resting peacefully again.

 

//

 

She sleeps for another twelve hours wherein Lexa only leaves the room for a few brief moments to relieve herself and change her clothing.

 

The rest of the time she sits beside Clarke’s bed or stands in the doorway.

 

Lexa is asleep in the chair beside Clarke’s bed the next time she comes around from her slumber. She alerts Lexa to her consciousness when she coughs herself awake. Her eyes are still tired but they are brighter as they look around the room and find Lexa sitting there.

 

She looks at Lexa for so many long, quiet moments, her eyes fluttering like she might fall back to sleep, before they open again.

 

“You’re not really here,” she croaks softly. “I’m dreaming again. Or ill. Or I’m finally dead.”

 

Lexa’s lips quirk into a smile as she remains seated in her chair. “I’m here, Clarke.”

 

Clarke looks at her again. She appears more awake the longer she looks and Lexa just watches her as she does so, appreciating the new pink in her cheeks and the reminder of just how wonderfully blue her eyes are.

 

“This must be heaven then,” she groans softly as Lexa watches reverently. “It seems like what heaven would be like.” She swallows to clear her throat before going on. “You’re here and you’re… you’re wearing _white_ , after all. And the sun is shining. And I can hear the ocean and I can see trees and… I can smell stew.” That fact causes her to frown. “I’d hoped that they would serve something better in the afterlife but whatever.”

 

Her brow quirks and her eyes close.

 

“I didn’t think I’d still need to pee, either…” she whispers, thoughtfully. “And my head is killing…”

 

She trails off and Lexa notices quickly how her face changes, how her muscles tense and her brow deepens dangerously into a scowl. There are long, silent moments where Lexa says nothing but the air around them changes as Clarke’s expression falls. Her hands curl into the sheets and her legs extend beneath the covers. Her lips purse and, as her eyes reopen, Lexa realizes that she spent so long anticipating Clarke’s recovery that she did not anticipate _this_.

 

_This_ suddenly seems like the most obvious thing in the world and she sits up straight as she watches Clarke’s face contort from exhaustion to confusion to anger in all of a few seconds.

 

“Get out,” she whispers.

 

Lexa sighs. “Clarke…”

 

Her eyes flare with anger and Lexa gets up from the chair, unsure if the sudden glassiness of Clarke’s eyes is from tears or fury.

 

“Get out,” Clarke says again and Lexa stands by the bedside but does not move.

 

She does not know how to leave her yet. She feels that she needs to explain.

 

The covers are quickly pushed back and Clarke stumbles as she attempts to get out of the bed. Lexa reaches for her as Clarke struggles to advance towards her and it’s the worse thing she could possibly do because suddenly Clarke is drawing back and screaming.

 

“Get _out_ ,” she shouts. “Get _out_! Get out! GET OUT!”

 

Lexa shakes her head and tries to ignore the sounds of bodies running towards them.

 

“Clarke,” she tries and she does not see the first blow coming.

 

It hits her about her left cheek and she isn’t sure if it’s from a fist or a palm. It doesn’t stop her from reaching for Clarke again and the second blow follows quickly, a palm making contact against the opposite cheek.

 

Lexa shakes her head, repeating Clarke’s name over and over as she tries to grab hold of her.

 

She wants to calm her but, right now, that feat seems impossible and all Lexa feels is guilt.

 

“You’re _not_ here,” Clarke growls and, when Lexa looks, the tears in her eyes are not from anger or sadness. They are from devastation. They are from betrayal. Both which she has caused. “You’re not here. You’re dead,” she squeaks and her arms flail to hit out as Lexa reaches for her again. “You’re _dead_. I watched you die. I watched you _die_. You can’t be here. You’re not here.”

 

Lexa manages to grab a hand. “Clarke—”

 

It does nothing and the bodies watching behind her witness as Clarke pulls her hand away like she’s been burned and strikes her again. The slaps transform into strikes of Clarke’s fists almost warningly. They curl dangerously, knowingly, and Lexa doesn’t stop reaching for her, even as the others try to pull her away.

 

“I’m sorry,” she says, as she does nothing to stop the fists from hitting her body. She feels the blood against her tongue from where her lip has split and her arms ache with the strength Clarke manages to muster. “I’m _sorry_ , Clarke.”

 

The words make Clarke worse. “I hate you!” she screams. “I _hate_ you!” Tears stream down her cheeks and that’s Lexa’s biggest concern as she stops reaching for her and just watches. Clarke doesn’t stop hitting her, even as blood seeps through her white bandages and threatens further injury. “How could you?!” she demands. “How could you?! How _dare_ you?!”

 

It’s Clio that puts a stop to it, putting her body between them, grabbing and holding Clarke’s hands as she turns and instructs Elena to take Lexa away. Lexa fights their insistence, shaking her head as she becomes aware of the way Elena’s arms grab around her waist to pull her backwards. She cannot leave when Clarke is fighting and sobbing against Clio’s body.

 

“She’s going to hurt herself,” Clio hisses warningly as she practically cradles Clarke’s fragile body. “You’re making this worse.”

 

Lexa shakes her head but Clio glares in warning.

 

“ _Go_ , Lexa.”

 

She does.

 

She fights off Elena’s arms and walks away. She doesn’t stop walking until she reaches the shore.

 

She can hear Clarke’s sobs the entire way.

 


	3. Part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _She smiles in sympathy and Clarke feels a gentle squeeze to her knee. She hears a despondent sigh._
> 
> _“It will all make sense eventually,” Clio murmurs._

_But if you loved me_

_Why’d you leave me?_

_Take my body_

_Take my body_

_\- “All I Want” by Kodaline_

 

//

 

Her body aches. Her limbs roar with the pain and exhaustion that afflicts them. Her head is pounding with the sound of her own pulse through her ears. Her entire body feels like it’s about to collapse out from beneath her but it’s the least of her worries.

 

Because there’s black blood coating her knuckles and sticking between her fingers that makes this whole thing even more real. It makes her feel one thousand times angrier than she thought she could ever be and it’s not helping her to calm down at all.

 

It’s making her hands shake and her chest hurt and she’s pretty sure she’s having a panic attack as she gasps for great lungfuls of air that aren’t able to come quick enough. She feels light-headed and nauseous but mostly she feels furious, angry that Lexa just stood there and didn’t fight back—didn’t do anything, didn’t say anything—that she’s even there _at all_.

 

Clarke’s seething and her brain is so fuzzy that nothing really makes any sense.

 

She has no idea what’s going on. She feels the pains of her body and the sounds that leave her mouth in anguish. She feels arms around her, firm hands guiding her towards the bed before someone kneels before her. Her body heaves with the sobs that leave her and it feels like they don’t stop for days until someone wipes a cloth over her face and her world comes back into focus.

 

A woman with golden blonde hair appears in her vision and Clarke frowns in confusion when the woman says her name.

 

“Clarke,” she says again calmly as she pulls on medical gloves. “My name is Clio.” She pauses, waiting for recognition to fill Clarke’s expression. She smiles stiffly when it does. “I’ve been taking care of you since you got here.”

 

Clarke pants for breath but manages to nod.

 

“I need you to control your breathing for me,” Clio says softly but Clarke’s too busy noticing that one of Lexa’s old handmaidens loiters in the doorway—one of her guards too—and it makes her breathe even more uneasily. She feels like she’s part of a conspiracy she never signed up for. Clio catches the panic quickly and grabs her chin to get her attention. “Hey. Breathing. Concentrate,” she says and Clarke frowns angrily but does as she’s told despite everything yelling at her not to. Clio presses against her thigh and it shoots pain all the way up and down her leg. “You’ve torn your sutures and probably reopened wounds that I was hoping to not have to stitch… but there’s nothing we can do about that now.”

 

Clarke is too busy glaring at the crowd in the doorway. When Clio snaps at them and they all disappear, she finds herself scoffing at the woman before her. She also catches sight of the red spots appearing through the long white night gown she’s wearing. She lifts it shamelessly, and groans when she notices the bandages around her leg where Clio is putting pressure, and finds another on her hip except the dressing has shifted and the wound has busted open.

 

Clio begins working on her, quietly encouraging her to lie on her back as she removes the soiled bandages. Clarke continues to seethe and pant as Clio patiently asks her questions about how she’s feeling and if she’s in any pain. The words reluctantly calm her down somehow, the reminder to concentrate on the things that her body is doing is enough encouragement to begin controlling them.

 

When Clarke tells her that she’s okay except for the sting of her injuries and a headache, she’s grateful when Clio gets up and closes the shutters.

 

She doesn’t say much more than that, other than informing Clarke of what she’s doing before she does it.

 

It takes Clarke way too long to realize that there are helpless tears still rolling on her cheeks. She wipes them away shamefully, hoping that Clio doesn’t see.

 

But that would be too much to ask.

 

Clio glances up at her as she begins to suture her leg again and catches them still rolling down her cheeks. She smiles in sympathy and Clarke feels a gentle squeeze to her knee. She hears a despondent sigh.

 

“It will all make sense eventually,” Clio murmurs.

 

Clarke doesn’t know how to believe her.

 

//

 

Lexa wraps her arms around her legs as the early chill of the evening begins to set in.

 

She’s glad when someone drops something heavy and woolen around her shoulders. She’s not at all surprised when Clio sits down in the sand beside her and kicks off her sandals.

 

“You have blood all over your face,” she whispers, quietly passing Lexa a washcloth.

 

It’s cool and wet and as soon as it touches her bloodied lip, it instantly feels better. She gingerly wipes at her face to clean off the blood before returning it to the cut against her lip that’s still oozing with black.

 

Clio buries her feet under the sand and they sit there quietly for a long time before she breaks the silence.

 

“That did not go how I expected,” Clio says light-heartedly. When Lexa says nothing, she continues. “She is… quite the surprise when she’s conscious.”

 

Lexa dabs at her lip with a finger and sighs. “I did try to warn you.”

 

They lapse into another silence before Lexa sighs and rests her chin on her knees.

 

“How is she?”

 

Clio chuckles under her breath. “She is resting again,” she says softly. “I redressed her injuries and had to suture a few but she’s fine. Worn out again and complaining of a headache, but that is to be expected.”

 

She breathes a sigh of relief and buries her face against her thighs. Clio rubs her back comfortingly and Lexa allows a few silent tears to roll down her cheeks before she looks up.

 

“I did not stop to consider that Clarke would be unaware of my well being,” she states carefully.

 

Clio falls backwards into the sand and groans. “You mean you didn’t stop to think that maybe she didn’t know you were alive still?” When Lexa turns back with a frown, Clio quirks an amused eyebrow at her. “You made every effort to ensure that fact would not be discovered.”

 

“He was supposed to tell her,” Lexa states.

 

Clio folds her arms over her chest. “Maybe he didn’t get a chance to,” she says. “These are the questions you need to ask her. You expected her within a few months. It has been a year, Lexa.”

 

A hand finds her back again and rubs soothingly until Clio begins speaking again.

 

“You must accept the fact that things have not gone how you planned,” she sighs in frustration. Lexa knows that frustration is because of her but ignores it. “They didn’t from the start and you have the wounds of that as evidence.”

 

Lexa buries her head in her thighs again before she falls backwards to lie beside Clio. She is unsurprised when Clio looks around briefly before reaching over and tugging her closer. It has always been the way of their relationship. It has always been their easiest kept secret. But the darkness descends on them quickly and Lexa honestly doesn’t care anymore. She shuffles closer to Clio and rests her head on her chest as an arm wraps around her shoulder.

 

“You _must_ talk to her,” Clio whispers as she reaches to pat down Lexa’s unruly hair.

 

Lexa sighs and knows better. She knows who Clarke is. She knows that there is only one thing that she can do.

 

“I must wait,” she corrects.

 

Clio clicks her tongue and shakes her head. “You need to talk to her about this. You need to make her see sense.”

 

Lexa shakes her head and sighs.

 

“No,” she says softly, plainly. “I must wait. She will talk to me when she is ready.”

 

Clio doesn’t say anything else. She huffs in frustration and turns to kiss Lexa on the forehead.

 

Despite everything, Lexa feels at peace.

 

//

 

Clarke wakes up during one of the most beautiful sunrises she’s ever seen.

 

The sky is colors that she never knew existed, only aided by the beautiful blue of the ocean. She watches it from out of the window in her room and cannot find herself angry and annoyed when she’s looking at something so magnificent. She doesn’t have the energy to be angry when she’s witnessing the miracle of world in front of her.

 

For a moment, she wonders if she _is_ in heaven and she got it all wrong.

 

Then she remembers how much pain she’s in.

 

She’s still sitting looking out of her window when Clio and the old handmaiden knock at her doorway.

 

“Good morning, _Wanheda_ ,” the handmaiden says and Clarke frowns at her before correcting her.

 

“Clarke,” she whispers. “My name is Clarke.”

 

The woman shares a look with Clio over her shoulder. She’s smiling wildly when she introduces herself.

 

“And I am Elena,” she says, holding out her hand. “I worked at the tower in Polis.”

 

Clarke quickly takes her hand. After all, she has done nothing wrong except follow orders.

 

“I remember,” she says before turning to where Clio sets out her equipment. “Is this a hospital?” she asks as the question has been bugging her since she woke up that morning and saw the old hospital bed and equipment in the next room. “I didn’t think that the grounders had hospitals like this.”

 

Clio says nothing and encourages her to sit in the chair by the bed before helping her to get comfortable. Elena is silent and goes about taking the sheets from the bed and tidying around the room like she never even heard Clarke speak. When she leaves the room, Clio wraps a blood pressure cuff around Clarke’s bare arm and begins speaking.

 

“We are not grounders here,” Clio explains softly and there is no offense in her tone even as Clarke feels sorry for the assumption. Clio smiles at her and continues to quietly explain. “Not in the traditional sense, anyway. Our island was somehow mostly protected from the bombs in the war. Much of the old town was preserved. The people and their ways, too. Language was the main thing—as we do not speak the language of the grounders here—and medicine was the other.”

 

Clio removes the blood pressure cuff and then takes her wrist to measure her pulse before she continues to speak.

 

“There were supply ships in the ocean here around the time the bombs fell and the stocks they carried were brought here once they finished falling. It was mostly medical supplies. Books. Things that were being taken to an American prison in Cuba.” She points behind her. “Which is about twenty miles that way.”

 

Clarke frowns and lets Clio work and talk quietly before she allows her curiosity to get to her. “And the people never tried to find the rest of the grounders? They never shared all these things left behind.”

 

Something flashes over Clio’s expression and she checks over Clarke’s bandages diligently.

 

“Some did. Quite a lot, actually,” she nods. “The stories told by the ancestors say that the ships went to the mainland first but there was nothing. They had hoped to find survivors but there weren’t any. Then they came here.”

 

Clarke listens curiously, and lets Clio do what she needs to do. She rests a hand on Clarke’s forehead to check her temperature before silently asking permission to lift her clothes and check her bandages.

 

“It took a long time before the first people left to seek others on the mainland,” she continues. “They were those who believed that our way of life would soon die out or that supplies would run out eventually. Later, others were unhappy because sometimes things are too simple here. There are not many answers to hard questions. There is no opposition. No tension or war. We live in harmony and it can become stressful for many. But many who have left do not do well on the mainland.”

 

Clarke hisses as Clio checks the wounds on her leg.

 

“Some get eaten by the gators,” Clio teases and Clarke blushes slightly before Clio looks up pointedly. “But mostly, the people of the mainland did not appreciate our ways once we found them. No one believes that such a community exists in a world where so much devastation was caused by the war… but they do not know any better. They believe that we are liars, that we are tricksters, or sometimes evil people performing devilish magic.”

 

She smiles lightheartedly but Clarke thinks back to the reactions she got to medicine when she first landed on the ground. She was almost killed more than once for her medical knowledge, or called a liar, and she can understand that what Clio says is true. It softens her resolve and makes her even more curious.

 

“You seem to know a lot about the grounders,” Clarke comments.

 

Clio chuckles. “That is because I am one,” she explains but then her face becomes coy. “Sort of. I am both, I suppose.”

 

When she stands, Clarke looks up in disappointment, wanting to know more. She knows, from the look in Clio’s eyes, that she will not be getting any more information today.

 

“Elena is preparing you a room in one of the cottages nearby,” she says instead of continuing her story. “You are well enough that you do not need my constant monitoring but I will be close by, just in case. The house will be more comfortable than this old clinic and it will give you the privacy that you perhaps need to recover.” Clarke can’t help but feel grateful, even as Clio smiles kindly like it is nothing. “I will visit you soon.”

 

Clarke watches her leave with more questions than she has answers.

 

//

 

“Have you slept at all?”

 

Lexa starts out of her daze and groans immediately at the still low position of the sun in the sky. She was so close to falling asleep.

 

Clio clicks her tongue and kicks at her thigh. Lexa groans up at her from where she sits with her back against the wall of the clinic. She has two blankets wrapped around her shoulders and she pulls them tighter around herself to protect from the early morning chill. She is not happy and she lets her expression inform Clio of that fact.

 

As usual, Clio does not care.

 

“You need to move,” she says sharply instead. “We are moving Clarke to one of the houses today. Go and find your bed. You are no good out here.”

 

Lexa rubs at her eyes and glares at Clio. “I cannot sleep.”

 

Clio tidies the area around the front of the clinic. “Then perhaps you should find somewhere to rest other than the ground. It cannot be comfortable, Lexa.”

 

Lexa opens her mouth to respond but Clio cuts her off quickly.

 

“And if you continue to mention anything about being worried or concerned then you can stop right now,” she murmurs plainly. “Clarke is fine. She is healing. She needs to recover both mentally and physically and you continuing to sit vigil outside her room every night when she is conscious and well is not going to help.”

 

Lexa knows that Clio is right but she doesn’t want to believe her. She knows that she has developed a habit in the days since Clarke arrived. She knows that she is obsessed with knowing if Clarke is okay, if she is breathing, but she was so sure for a while that she would stop. Now nothing will make her feel at ease like the gentle rise and fall of Clarke’s chest does.

 

“Talk to her,” Clio says impatiently holding out a hand to help her up. “Or don’t. But if you’re not going to talk to her, then don’t do _this_.” Lexa takes the hand and soon they are face to face. Clio does not look impressed. “You are better than this.”

 

It gets through to her, reluctantly. She returns to the small home that the community had found for her once she had arrived. It is nothing large but it is big enough for Lexa, and larger than those of her few neighbors. Lexa had been reluctant to accept it but knowledge of her achievements had come far and the people here respected her. They respected what she had tried and failed to do.

 

The house is not as grand as the commander’s tower but it is welcoming enough to remind Lexa of the home that she had grown up in before her nightblood was discovered. It has white-stained walls and big open windows. She has a table where she eats her breakfast each morning and a couch where she can rest in the afternoons. She enjoys sitting in her garden in the afternoons when it is warmer and the earth is dry. Clio had instructed her to begin reading all the books left from before the war and she enjoys curling up under homemade blankets or in the hammock Fitz had made her, and reading their strange stories, even though there are some she already knows.

 

She does not do any of those things today.

 

Instead, she finds her bed and lays there until her stubborn body gives in to rest. She is grateful for the heavy drapes one of Clio’s associates had found for her when she first arrived. They block out the sun and it takes less time to sleep than she anticipates. It is fitful, however, and she wakes up in the dark to find the blankets tangled uncomfortably around her body.

 

The small village is quiet with slumber when she leaves her bed. The moon is high in the sky and Lexa wraps her blankets around her shoulders and heads to the shore. It is so calm at night and she settles beneath the same palm tree she always does as she stares up at the moon and stars.

 

She almost feels like she could return to her bed and sleep for another day when she hears someone walking behind her.

 

She turns to chastise Clio for monitoring her but stops when she finds the last person she expected to see.

 

Clarke’s expression changes like she did not expect this either.

 

As much as Lexa wishes to go to her, she pulls her blankets around her shoulders and stands instead.

 

“Don’t,” a voice says warningly as she makes to leave. “Don’t you _dare_ …”

 

Lexa breathes out unsteadily. “I do not wish to upset you, Clarke.”

 

She scoffs and throws herself to sit in the sand.

 

“Well, it’s too late for that,” she murmurs bitterly.

 

Lexa hovers behind her, unmoving and unsure what to do. She wraps her blanket more securely around herself. She watches the way that Clarke watches the ocean instead of the stars and the moon and the way that her hands play with the soft white sand beneath her hands. Lexa wonders if Clarke has ever seen anything like this and it makes her smile as she curiously plays with it.

 

“How long have you been here?” Clarke asks suddenly, her face turned away from Lexa and brow furrowed.

 

Lexa sits down and leans back against the palm tree, faced towards her. Clarke still does not look happy. Lexa wraps her blankets around herself protectively.

 

“I came here straight from Polis,” she tells her carefully. “I do not remember how long it took.”

 

Clarke struggles. Lexa can see that. She shakes her head like she wants to shout but instead her words come out through tight teeth.

 

“But _how_?” she spits angrily. “I watched you _die,_ Lexa. You bled out. Your heart stopped beating.” She pauses and Lexa can hear how struggled and heavy her breathing is as she watches the sand drift between her fingers. “Your blood covered my hands.”

 

Lexa swallows back the emotion from her voice and tries to be as plain and unassuming as possible.

 

“There was a plan in place,” she explains. “It was bigger than either you or I.”

 

Blue eyes turn around to her quickly and glare in warning.

 

“That’s not _good_ enough,” Clarke says loudly. “That’s not goddamn good enough, Lexa. The entire world went to _shit_ when you died and I had to put it back together. I had to stop a _war_. Do you understand that? You can’t just tell me that there was a plan in place. A plan for what? For _who_?”

 

Lexa looks at her for a long time, unsure what Clarke wants to hear, but then she sees recognition soon spark in Clarke’s eyes. The plan was for her and she knows it. Her eyes darken and Lexa can tell that they have seen awful things. The person behind them has _done_ horrible, terrible things. Clarke looks older with her eyes open and Lexa sighs again because it is her fault.

 

“The commanders warned me, a few days prior to my leaving, that there was something afoot that I would not be able to solve,” Lexa swallows and tries to remember the very few foggy memories that she has of those last few days before she left. There is only one memory that she wishes to recall regularly and even that is dulling at the edges. “I was informed by the voices of the oldest and most revered commanders that my services were no longer needed and that I should sacrifice myself for the good of my people. They informed me that, if handled correctly, my death would allow a chain of events to happen that would save the world.”

 

Clarke says nothing and Lexa knows that she can tell what is coming. Her gaze remains steadfast out at sea and her head shakes in refusal of what she she’s about to hear.

 

“They said that _you_ were the only one who could save the world,” Lexa goes on. “That your knowledge and technology would be the only thing that could save everyone. They told me that the commander must choose their successor wisely and that I had to choose you.” Lexa smiles to herself. “It made too much sense for me to argue. So I did what they told me.”

 

Clarke swipes over her face with an angry hand. “That doesn’t explain how you’re alive, Lexa.”

 

Lexa admires her profile, glad to be free of the burden of this truth at last. “I was instructed to tell only those who needed to know. At that point, it was a suicide mission… and the only person I wanted to tell was Clio.”

 

Curiosity piques in Clarke’s expression and she turns vaguely to see Lexa’s face. “And _why_ is Clio so important?” she asks and Lexa wishes that what she hears is jealousy.

 

She squashes that thought immediately.

 

“She is my sister, Clarke.”

 

Clarke’s eyes widen and there’s almost relief there. She turns to Lexa briefly, questioning eyes and curious expression still in place. Lexa wraps the blankets more comfortably around her body before shrugging and continuing.

 

“We share the same father,” Lexa explains. “Clio’s mother is from this island and she left here when she was young and rebellious. She did not agree with the ways of her people. But _my_ people did not appreciate her knowledge. She became quiet and withdrawn and erased who she truly was before she met our father. She taught Clio the ways and abilities of her people in secret but then she was killed and our father met my mother and they had me.” She smiles sadly. “Our family has always been exceptional. But Clio is outspoken and unafraid of who she and her mother were. She made her knowledge known and she did things that others viewed as unnatural. They asked me to put her to death.”

 

“And did you fake her death, too?” Clarke quips angrily.

 

Lexa takes a deep breath. “No,” she says. “But there was a plan in place until I managed to talk my people into banishing Clio here instead. She and I used birds to communicate for years. Birds that she trained herself. And I told her what was happening and she reminded me of that plan.”

 

Lexa frowns and struggles to remember much after that. “She arrived the following day, in disguise, and told me what would happen. That she would give me something to slow my heartbeat and that my people would believe I was dead. I made Titus aware of what would happen, and Elena and Fitz, as we would need another body and Clio would need help to escape with me.”

 

Clarke shakes her head like she can’t believe what she’s hearing. “But then he shot you and you died, Lexa.”

 

Her memories of that moment are foggy and unclear. She vaguely remembers his mistake and whispering instructions to him while Clarke was shouting at someone else. She remembers that he gave her something while Clarke and someone else weren’t watching. It did not register that what he was giving her was the vial of medicine that she’d watched Clio pass him that morning. She remembers becoming sleepy and actually feeling like she was dying. She remembers Clarke saying goodbye and not knowing how to say anything in return. But she does not remember more beyond that. Her first vivid memory is waking up in the clinic bed many, many weeks after.

 

But these are not the things that she tells Clarke.

 

“Titus was to inform you of my whereabouts—of the truth—once the world was safe,” she murmurs. “Is this what happened?”

 

Clarke looks at her in disgust.

 

“Titus died hours after you did!” she shouts angrily, eyes red with warning. “Aden too, do you realize that?! Do you realize that, in saving yourself, you killed everyone who cared about you and ruined _everything_ you’d ever achieved? Do you realize that?! That Aden was murdered and that Titus gave up everything to protect that goddamn flame?!”

 

Lexa is shocked by the information and she processes it slowly. She reminds herself of what the commanders had told her that day when she was given her instructions.

 

“They knew their sacrifice,” she whispers. Clarke’s face falls in even more disgust and disappointment. Lexa tries not to look away from her, to remain sure of her choices. She knows that all of this was for the greater good. “Titus knew that the flame needed to end with you. He gave his life to protect it. That was his purpose.”

 

Clarke looks at her like she’s looking at a monster, like Lexa is something she doesn’t know. But she’s looked at Lexa this way before and Lexa promises herself right then that she will never do anything more to make Clarke look at her in this way again. Tears roll down Clarke’s cheeks and she shakes her head sadly.

 

“And he gave that purpose to _me_ ,” she whispers dangerously. “He gave me the flame and I protected it. I protected _you_. You were in the flame but you were also here— _hiding_ —like the goddamn coward that you are.”

 

Lexa looks away then, out at the ocean. She has no excuses. She has very few regrets.

 

Clarke is not ready to hear them yet.

 

Lexa stands and wraps her blankets around herself again. She does not want to upset Clarke anymore. She needs more time and Lexa can give that to her.

 

“We must rest,” she whispers and turns to leave, but not before Clarke grabs her by the arm and turns her around.

 

They are face to face again and Lexa wonders if she has a knife, if she wishes to do her harm like the last time they stood like this. She knows she doesn’t by the way that Clarke’s entire body vibrates with anger and continued shock. Her blue eyes explore Lexa’s face like she’s still trying to figure out if all of this is real. She shivers with the breeze and Lexa’s expression does not waver as she removes one of the blankets around her shoulders and folds it around Clarke instead.

 

Clarke’s expression falls, her face twitches, and her brow furrows even more. She looks torn but then her hands rise. For a second, Lexa is sure that she will be struck or pushed or hurt in some other way, but then Clarke’s arms drop and she grits her jaw.

 

“You have betrayed everyone,” she breathes bitterly. “You betrayed me _again_. You have dishonored your people. You are a coward. You are a _coward_ and I _hate_ you. I hate you.”

 

Lexa smiles mirthlessly and pulls the blanket back around Clarke when it threatens to blow from around her body.

 

“That’s okay,” she says as she urges the edges of the blanket into Clarke’s hand. “No one can hate me more than I hate myself.”

 

She is surprised when Clarke takes the blanket, but she does not wait to ponder it.

 

Instead she turns and leaves.

 

_It is for the best_ , a voice no longer present inside of her whispers.

 

Lexa is beginning to wonder if that is true.

 

//

 

Clarke has seen the ocean, but she never paid any attention to it.

 

There was too much going on the last time, too much to do, too many to save. She never realized how relaxing and calming it is, how gentle and rhythmic, but at the same time lethal and unforgiving it can be.

 

She can’t seem to look away from it now that she’s here.

 

She can’t seem to sleep now that she’s awake and it doesn’t make any sense because the reason she couldn’t sleep—the memories, the dreams, the cruelty of her own imagination—has been proved irrelevant. The feelings she had have become meaningless.

 

Lexa _is_ alive.

 

Her dreams have come true. There is nothing else to grieve.

 

All that is left is her anger and disappointment and betrayal.

 

“Clarke?” someone says and Clarke looks up to find Elena looking at her from further up the shore. She smiles kindly, like it isn’t odd at all that Clarke is staring at a sunrise hidden behind dark, stormy skies. “Would you like some breakfast?”

 

Clarke is ready to say no, when the gurgling of her stomach betrays her. Elena chuckles and steps closer, not batting an eyelid at Clarke’s blushed cheeks. She helps Clarke to her feet and they walk back to Clarke’s small cottage quietly.

 

“What would you like to eat?” Elena asks once she has found her way to the small kitchen at the back of the cottage.

 

Clarke shrugs and struggles with sore limbs to settle in the large armchair by the window. “What do you have?

 

Elena laughs again. “Well _you_ have nothing in here but I can fetch some things. I would need to light the fire in the stove first if you would like something warm.”

 

Clarke thinks about it as she begins to drift off to sleep in the armchair. Elena must notice because she moves over to put the blanket Clarke dropped to the floor around her shoulders. Clarke’s eyes flutter open when she smells the familiar scent of someone else on the fabric. It makes her feel angry but it also makes her feel safe.

 

“I can fetch some eggs, some fish,” Elena says quietly. “Maybe some fruit or vegetables?”

 

Clarke can already feel herself dozing again. “I could eat a horse.”

 

“We do not eat the horses,” Elena teases, causing Clarke to smirk. “But I will find you a feast, _Wanheda_.”

 

Clarke frowns and curls into the cushions of the chair. There is rain starting to fall in the distance and the sound of it is soothing. “My name is—”

 

“I do not care,” Elena says softly. “To me, _you_ will always be _Wanheda_ and _she_ will always be _Heda_. You will always be the heroes that saved my people—my family—and even though I am no longer with them, knowing that they are safe is enough. I will forever be grateful.”

 

The sentiment makes Clarke uneasy and she’s glad when Elena leaves a few moments later. She drifts off to sleep not long after, watching the rain as it falls in heavy drops out the window. She wakes some time after, to the smells filling up the small cottage as Elena moves around it, cleaning and organizing as she goes. She has piles of clothes in her arms that she folds away into a nearby dresser.

 

“Smells good,” Clarke mumbles. Elena does not turn and continues with her work. “What are those?”

 

Elena does not even glance at her. “They are clean clothes. For you.” She clicks her tongue. “No more going out in your nightdress.”

 

Clarke glances down at the white nightgown she wears. It’s a little off-color in patches but it’s been kind of nice to wear something clean. It goes down to her knees and she has little underneath it anymore. She enjoys the freedom it allows her, the freshness, especially in this warmer climate.

 

“I have already started to heat some water on the stove,” Elena continues. “You’re going to have a bath, then I’m going to make you something to eat.”

 

Clarke looks down at her already mostly clean body and frowns as she realizes. She was filthy before she arrived here. She dreads to think of what happened while she was unconscious, of how many people have seen her naked. It almost makes her skin itch. She watches uncomfortably as Elena fills the tub in the bathroom. She almost asks questions but decides she doesn’t want to know the answers. She’s glad when Elena excuses herself while she has a bath.

 

Clarke removes the clothing she wears as well as the bandages on her body. She doesn’t anticipate there being a mirror in this tiny bathroom but there is one behind the door. It’s cracked and dirtied at the edges, it’s surface scrubbed and scratched, but Clarke moves towards it, curiously.

 

She’s a little taken aback by the sight of herself. It feels like it’s been forever since she’s been acquainted with her own image. There are scratches, in all stages of healing, covering pretty much most of her body. There are some nasty ones on her face, covering her forehead and her cheeks and she touches them to barely feel a sting. There are bigger wounds on her stomach and hips and she honestly doesn’t remember where they came from. A few have stitches and others have pulled awkward, jagged scars into her skin. Her leg is still red and bruised and angry from the bite marks that cover her left thigh. It’s slightly swollen and the healing has barely started. She doesn’t touch it for fear of opening any precarious wounds, wiggles the toes of her slowly healing feet, and sighs.

 

She’s closely inspecting her face again when she notices her hair. Her eyes look and feel old and tired but they still manage to notice the braids in her hair, pulling the wayward front sections back from her face. She touches them gently, noticing how they don’t match the weary appearance of the rest of her body. Her hair is clean, a brighter, more gold blonde than she ever remembers it being. The braids make her look youthful—pretty—and she decides to leave them as they are as she makes her way over to the tub.

 

It’s hot but refreshing and the steam helps to settle her weariness. Elena has set out soap and washcloths for her but she doesn’t touch them yet, too busy enjoying the way the warm water eases her muscles and slows her heart.

 

And when she does reach for the soap, it smells oddly familiar. Like flowers and clean linens. She holds it close to her face and breathes it in, tries to think of where she’s smelled it before.

 

Her face falls when she remembers. She washes quickly, gets out of the bath with some difficulty due to her injuries, and wraps herself in the soft sheet of toweling that Elena had left out for her, before leaving the room to search for fresh clothing.

 

Elena is preparing fresh produce in the kitchen when she exits and pays no attention as Clarke makes her way around the corner into the bedroom. Elena has left out some of the clothes for her to pick from. Clarke spends too long feeling the texture of the soft fabrics and enjoying the lighter colors of the underwear, pants and shirts left for her. She knows that it’s to keep her cool but, as she pulls on the underwear and white linen shirt, it feels odd to be wearing such cheerful clothing.

 

“You’re going to need bandages for that leg,” someone says and Clarke looks up to find Clio standing in the doorway. She carries her doctor’s bag and has a stethoscope around her neck. She indicates for Clarke to lean back and then she quietly goes about checking the wound before wrapping it nicely. Clarke gets no say in having her pulse checked and her blood pressure taken. She lifts Clarke’s feet into her hands and appraises them silently before wrapping them in bandages too. “Just in case you end up down at the beach again,” she whispers. “These need to stay clean.”

 

Clarke rolls her eyes and then carefully grabs the pants to pull up her legs. They’re soft and worn. Clio follows her back out into the kitchen to find Elena nowhere to be seen. Clarke quietly indicates for Clio to sit on the couch and they sit in silence until Elena bustles in with an armful of fresh eggs. She pays them no mind as she silently cooks, not until she’s done and bringing them over plates of fresh vegetables and eggs and some sort of sausage.

 

“I don’t think I’ve ever had vegetables this good,” Clarke mumbles as she instantly inhales it.

 

It’d been dried meat and whatever she could scavenge on her travels until this. Before that it was the roasted animals the hunters brought and the odd root vegetables that grew in the forest turned into a stew. This food tastes fresh and natural. Even the bowls of stew they had brought her yesterday had been delicious and flavorful. As Elena switches out her plate for a bowl of freshly cut, brightly colored fruit, Clarke brings it to her mouth, not anticipating the sweet juices that run down her chin.

 

“Do you grow it?” Clarke asks curiously, grateful when she’s handed a rag to wipe her hands.

 

Clio and Elena share a look. Clio’s brow raises and Elena presses her hands to her hips before she speaks. Clarke instantly knows there’s something unsaid that she won’t like.

 

“Lexa grows it,” Elena explains. “Her cottage has a large garden and there were lots of crops already growing in it that nobody was tending to…”

 

She stops speaking and instead lets Clarke process what she’s hearing. She can’t imagine Lexa—the commander of the grounders— _gardening_. So much of what Clarke knows about Lexa is about her taking life and fixing what already exists rather than growing something new. She’s still sitting there thinking quietly when Elena disappears to clean their plates. Clio sits silently, eating slowly from the bowl that Elena had given her too.

 

“The garden was a large part of her recovery,” is all she offers and Clarke frowns in question but doesn’t ask what Clio means.

 

She doesn’t want her to know that she cares.

 

Clio doesn’t seem to want to offer her anything else in explanation anyway. She pushes the rest of her fruit into Clarke’s hands and reaches for her bag.

 

“I will be back the day after tomorrow,” she says, wrapping the stethoscope around her neck. “No more meandering at night and sleeping on the beach,” she says. “You must stay warm and clean. I will bring you some books to read that you may enjoy.”

 

She leaves and, once again, Clarke has more questions than answers.

 

//

 

Clio finds her sitting amongst her flowerbeds, hands covered with dirt, and a scowl on her face.

 

She sits upon the upturned bucket in the corner of the garden and appraises Lexa and her work carefully. She has dug out three new flowerbeds, just this afternoon, and her new people understand what that means. She’s sure that they have told Clio of her plight and that’s why she is here.

 

It has been three days since she saw Clarke by the beach. It has been three days of seeing her in passing and of being terribly and pointedly ignored. It is almost like Lexa doesn’t exist and no matter what is done, Clarke will not acknowledge her.

 

She thinks it is beginning to annoy the others.

 

Her patience is also beginning to wane.

 

Lexa is up to her elbows in fresh earth, planting flower bulbs that will hopefully grow and be beautiful soon enough, when Clio speaks.

 

“What is your plan here?” she says bitterly. “Are you just going to let her ignore you until one day she gets bored? Or do you have something in play that is much less stupid than that?”

 

Lexa smirks. “I will think of something eventually.”

 

Clio hums thoughtfully. “So there is no plan?”

 

Lexa gathers the earth back into the ground and pats it down around the bulbs. “I do not need a plan,” she says breathlessly, wiping the sweat from her forehead. “I need to be patient.”

 

Clio looks at her like she’s stupid, her face slack and irritated. She picks up a handful of leftover dirt and Lexa looks away just in time for it to hit her the side of her face instead.

 

“She does not want to speak with you,” she says as Lexa brushes the dirt away. She’s sure she only makes it worse with her dirty hands but Elena promised to help her make a bath later anyway.

 

“Yes, she does,” she says resolutely.

 

Perhaps Clio is beginning to think that she is insane by the way that she stares at her. “She hit you. The mere mention of your name changes her entire mood. She walks the opposite direction when she sees you,” Clio reminds her and Lexa remembers the few occasions over the last few days where Clarke had just done that. It still stings her pride. “What on earth did you draw from those actions that makes you believe she wants to speak to you?”

 

Lexa chuckles mirthlessly. “That she cares. If she did not care, she would not do it. I would not matter. She’s angry and I just have to be patient.”

 

“And how long will that take?”

 

Lexa shrugs. Clio’s glare stresses for more information but Lexa shrugs again.

 

“It will take as long as it takes,” she says finally.

 

Clio stands up and instantly kicks the pile of dirt into Lexa’s face in frustration.

 

“This is excruciating,” she whispers. “At least show some effort to get into her good graces, _goufa_.”

 

Lexa chuckles and stands instead to fetch the watering can. “I do appreciate how you only ever use our mother tongue to insult me.”

 

“There is no better word to explain how childish you are,” Clio quips quickly. She watches Lexa water her new flowerbeds and then wash off her hands with what remains in the can afterwards. Lexa wonders what she’s thinking, what she remembers. The worry in her eyes never seems to leave anymore, even though there is little to be concerned with. “Can you not just tell her the truth? Can you not just be honest and tell her how you feel?”

 

Lexa feels an ache in her gut, right around where her scar is. It’s the only reminder she needs of what she has done. She smiles sadly and shakes her head.

 

“I fear that would only upset her more.”

 

Clio leaves mumbling in curse words of both languages.

 

Lexa understands how she feels.

 

//

 

She should have expected that, when Clio invited her for dinner, there was potentially an ulterior motive

 

Sure, she had presented it as a way for Clarke to get to know the rest of her people, but Clarke had forgotten who that also included.

 

It surprises her at the same time as it doesn’t.

 

She isn’t surprised that Lexa is here, because they are sisters, after all. But she is surprised at what Lexa’s doing.

 

Clio’s cottage sits close by the clinic, larger than Clarke’s own, and home to a large garden area covered with wooden decking on one side and an outdoor kitchen on the other. They’re joined together by a fire pit, buried into the ground. A dozen or so people sit around on the benches, battered wooden chairs and three-legged short stools that surround it, and talk quietly amongst themselves.

 

But Lexa quietly stands in the outdoor kitchen area with Elena as she shouts instructions to Fitz. There’s a knife in Lexa’s hands and she carefully chops fruits and vegetables from the basket beside her. She smiles softly as she slips a piece of fruit between her lips and comments at something Fitz says.

 

She’s so used to seeing Lexa look so powerful and regal that it feels strange to see her like this. She looks so _normal_. She blends in to the group quietly—an equal to her companions—and Clarke would never have noticed her if she hadn’t spent so long searching for her face in every single room.

 

She struggles to watch her without feeling things she doesn’t want to and turns away to find Clio watching her with a crooked, knowing smile. She approaches slowly and offers Clarke a glass of wine that she quickly and quietly declines.

 

“I wouldn’t have come if I’d known she was going to be here,” she comments because she feels like she needs to.

 

Clio nods. “Of course,” she says but she doesn’t sound like she believes it. “Have you been enjoying the books I brought?”

 

Clarke glances around at the other people here. Most of them she has seen in passing. Some have visited to pay their respects and introduce themselves. They smile at her politely and Clarke smiles back. After so many months on the ground, she’s never known a group of people more welcoming and kind.

 

“I’ve read them,” Clarke says and Clio laughs at her quickly.

 

“Already?” she questions. “That was a lot of books, Clarke.”

 

Clarke shrugs and rolls her eyes as Fitz ushers her into a chair under Elena’s knowing gaze. Still, it eases the aches and sores of her injuries and she’s grateful for their concern, their unwavering support and care.

 

When she doesn’t respond to the question, Clio frowns at her knowingly.

 

“You are still not sleeping well?”

 

Clarke continues the silence, sheepish when Clio watches her appraisingly.

 

“That is to be expected I suppose,” she comments. “You have come from a different world, Clarke. This can be a shock to some.”

 

When Clarke shoots her a pointed look, Clio chuckles to herself and takes a sip of the wine in her hand. They are saved a moment later by one of the elders approaching them. She introduces herself quietly and they chat while others arrive and until Elena begins cooking the food on the fire. Once it’s ready, they pass it around and Clarke sits quietly amongst the chatter of those around her. They talk about things she doesn’t understand and she listens to what they’re saying with curiosity. She adamantly ignores the one person she doesn’t want to see until she can’t help it and finds green eyes warmly watching her.

 

It’s too much and Clarke’s glad when a few of the elders begin playing the instruments they brought with them. They sing songs that sound familiar but that she doesn’t really recognize anymore. They start out with fast songs and Clarke watches as some of them get up and dance. Some politely ask her to dance with them but she declines due to her injuries. Elena and Fitz had brought her a walking stick two day before and she had been indignant at first but has been using it ever since. She smiles and watches as they dance together happily, like they never would have been allowed to before, and Clarke wonders how long they had been in service to others before they came here. They look happy and Clarke watches as Lexa encourages their enjoyment. She watches as Lexa reluctantly dances with Fitz, her smiling clumsiness making Clarke’s chest ache with things she doesn’t want to recognize anymore than she wants to feel them.

 

It does not become overwhelming to be there until the songs become slower.

 

Clarke’s heart skips a beat when she recognizes the opening notes of a familiar song that she never expected to hear on the ground.

 

_Elvis_ , she thinks, eyes glazing over as she remembers how her parents had played her his music as a child and how they had always danced around to his love songs. The sentimentality is too much as she listens to the lyrics and she glances over to Lexa without thinking, surprised to find glassy green eyes staring back at her.

 

Her breath catches at the open longing she finds staring back at her.

 

She angrily gets to her feet a second later, set on returning to her cottage and stewing in her own sadness and memories.

 

She doesn’t anticipate the gentle hand that grabs her elbow and slows her down.

 

“Slow down, Clarke,” she murmurs and instantly lets go when Clarke swings around to face her.

 

She wants to shout but she can’t when she sees the look on Lexa’s face. It’s a mix of guilt and concern and hurt. Clarke sees it and understands that Lexa has been through more than she’ll ever be aware of. It doesn’t stop Lexa from being the only person who might understand her but it also doesn’t stop her from being the person who has betrayed her the most.

 

She just turns and continues walking away from her.

 

They’re back at the beach before Clarke turns to her again. She feels the tears before she anticipates them, rolling steadily down her cheeks.

 

Lexa’s expression changes when she sees them. She becomes more desperate. Her hands fumble at her sides and she tries to edge closer.

 

“Clarke,” Lexa whispers and it sounds like she’s asking for permission as she holds her hands out to Clarke in offering.

 

It’s permission Clarke isn’t ready to give yet and she shrugs her off, shakes her head as she aimlessly paces in the sand. She feels like she’s going insane.

 

“You know, I can’t sleep,” she mumbles and Lexa listens to her quietly and curiously. “I can’t sleep. And I used to not sleep because every single time I closed my eyes—even for a few minutes—I’d dream that you were still alive and that you were safe and that you weren’t dead because of me. So in the end, I just stopped sleeping because I couldn’t… I couldn’t watch you _die_ again.”

 

Lexa sighs and edges closer but Clarke moves away and lets her hand clutch at her diaphragm as she struggles.

 

“And now that you’re alive, I can’t sleep because I’m scared I’ll wake up one morning and you’ll be gone again,” she chokes. “I’m scared that you’ll be dead and that my chest will fill with grief again and that grief…” She pauses and takes in a shuddering breath, remembering all those days she spent in heartache wishing, wanting, and wondering. “That grief is _suffocating_. I feel that grief in every inch of my body and it never eases, it just seems to get worse with every single day and I can’t—I can’t do this anymore.”

 

Lexa moves closer and Clarke doesn’t stop her. She turns to her and gathers the courage to look her in the eye. She looks terrified.

 

“And you made me feel like that on _purpose_ , Lexa,” Clarke whispers brokenly. “You planned making me feel this way—and I don’t care if you were eventually going to tell me the truth—the fact that you planned to do this to me _at all_ —that you didn’t even _think_ about what it would do to me—that’s what makes me hate you most of all. That you did this on _purpose_.”

 

Lexa takes a deep breath and Clarke doesn’t pull back when she feels fingers whispering over hers where they hold the walking stick.

 

Lexa sighs and Clarke stares over her shoulder, perfectly aware of the way that green eyes are studying her face and her expressions. She doesn’t see the shock or the confusion that sit there. She doesn’t see the endless regret and the million unsaid things that there will never be enough words for.

 

“I would have done much worse,” she comments.

 

Clarke glances at her and frowns. “For _what_?”

 

Lexa shrugs and Clarke’s seen that expression on her face so many times. That longing, that desperation. It doesn’t matter because she always betrays her anyway.

 

“For a future,” she whispers. “For a chance.”

 

Clarke looks at her and instantly feels that pull. She feels her body waver and her heart yells at her to just let Lexa catch her while her head tells her to stop being so stupid. She shakes her head and steps back.

 

“That’s not good enough,” she whispers.

 

She’s glad that Lexa doesn’t follow when she leaves.

 

She doesn’t breathe steadily for hours.

 

 

 


	4. Part 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“She has ruined you, Lexa…”_
> 
> _Lexa shakes her head. “No,” she disagrees. “She hasn’t. I am happy. She is safe.”  
> _

 

_You taught me the courage of stars before you left._

_How light carries on endlessly, even after death._

_With shortness of breath, you explained the infinite._

_How rare and beautiful it is to even exist._

 

_\- “Saturn” by Sleeping At Last_

 

//

 

“You shouldn’t be in here,” Clio says and Lexa sighs and continues her search.

 

Her movements slow and Clio watches her until she eventually stops and turns to her like a chastised child.

 

“I know,” she mumbles guiltily. “I’m sorry… I was just… looking for something.”

 

It’s been two days since she saw Clarke at the beach again. It’s been two days of thinking and wondering if she’s doing the right thing. They’ve been two days that have led her here: to the stash of things that Clio inherited when her grandparents died alongside the clinic and the cottages.

 

Clio doesn’t appear to be angry or annoyed and she pushes off from where she leans against the doorframe and steps towards her to see where she’s looking.

 

“Well, can I help you?” she says instead of telling her that she shouldn’t be here again.

 

Lexa looks up at the shelves of things that Clio’s ancestors rescued and stored away in response. Most of the huge space is where she keeps her medical supplies but the rest of it is where her grandfather kept his treasures. Clio often tells stories of how the amount slowly dwindled because he would give them away as gifts to worthy recipients. She often tells Lexa of how the biggest gift he gave her before he passed on was the medical knowledge that had been shared through generations. Her mother had attempted to pass it on first but that goal had been prevented by her death.

 

“I want something to give Clarke,” she admits and Clio’s expression gives away nothing before her mouth lifts into a gentle smile. “I was thinking that perhaps I could go hunting but…”

 

She trails off and feels foolish when Clio rubs a soothing, placating hand over her back.

 

“You are like a cat,” she tells her teasingly. “Wanting to bring her dead animals and hoping for her approval.”

 

Lexa sighs and pushes her away indignantly. Clio chuckles and it does not make Lexa feel anything other than more frustrated. Clio must notice this quickly as she stops and clicks her tongue.

 

“I am trying,” Lexa whispers and hates that she feels tears in her eyes. “I am trying, Clio… but I am beginning to feel that what I have done to Clarke, the pain that I have put her through, the experiences that I left her to endure… I think they are unforgivable.” Her brow gathers together and she shakes her head. “They _are_ unforgivable and now I am wasting the last of my hope by doing superfluous things that will never allow her to forgive me.”

 

Clio’s arms wrap around her and Lexa accepts the embrace, grateful when Clio strokes her back like their father used to when they were children. It is the way they learned to embrace others—embrace one another—and Lexa doesn’t understand when it stopped feeling comfortable to hold people like this, when she became too hard and unforgiving.

 

She knows that she stopped the moment she met Clarke.

 

“Here,” Clio whispers before she pulls back and quickly presses a kiss for Lexa’s forehead. “I will help you find everything you need for her…”

 

//

 

Clarke spends much of her time reading from Clio’s extensive library of books. She spends most of it curled up in the chair by the window, rested against the many cushions and pillows that Elena brings her, with a book in her arms and stories of another time in her head.

 

Elena and Fitz have taken to walking around the island with her and showing her around when she has the energy. They have showed her how the people here do things: how they get food, how they wash their clothes, where their water comes from. It’s fascinating to Clarke in the same way that the ground was when she arrived. But this place is much more kind and forgiving than the ground had been.

 

She has noticed that someone keeps leaving her things when she is out.

 

It started with fruits and vegetables that she thought nothing of until Elena frowned and wondered aloud where they came from. Then it was sweet homemade things: cookies and cakes. Then warm, freshly made stew and bread that was left warming on the stove.

 

It had confused Clarke but Elena had informed her that the locals were kind and probably concerned for her wellbeing, that the elders most likely wanted her to be aware of the produce that they had to offer.

 

She didn’t think anything of it, really, until she came home to a fresh vase of flowers sitting on the table by her chair. It was Elena’s silence and Fitz’s gentle smile that had told her what she suspected.

 

Neither of them looked surprised when the flowers were taken and left outside. Instead, they bustled around preparing the items they had gathered from the market that morning.

 

Elena did begin to look saddened when she removed the flowers the next day, and the day after that.

 

Clarke noticed the way that they began to look disappointed, the way that Clio became quieter and less friendly with each visit.

 

She didn’t fully understand the depths of her anger and annoyance until she returned to her cottage one rainy afternoon to find a pile of sketchbooks and drawing materials sitting on the table, wrapped with ribbon, and a tiny white flower sitting atop it. It made her see red. It reminded her of a version of herself that she was sure didn’t exist anymore. She gathered the things into her arms and marched up the street to where she had discovered Lexa’s cottage was. She found her placing buckets out in her garden to collect the rainwater. She saw the unbridled hope that covered her face when she saw Clarke coming.

 

Clarke removed that hope from her expression when she tossed the art materials down at her feet and into the growing slosh of mud there. It splattered up Lexa’s legs, practically ruined the gift, and left Lexa’s face fallen.

 

Clarke said nothing. She just glared in warning.

 

Lexa understood. She smiled politely and reached down to gather the things from the mud, wiping most of it off with the rag tucked into her apron. She held them against her chest, gave Clarke a passing smile, and then disappeared inside.

 

It didn’t make Clarke feel better. It didn’t make her feel superior.

 

When she turned around to see Clio, Elena and Fitz gathered beyond the entrance to Lexa’s garden, all she saw was sadness and disappointment.

 

All she saw was the same growing shame she’d seen every day before she left Polis.

 

All she felt was the first small pangs of regret.

 

//

It should make her want to give up but it doesn’t.

 

She still gives baskets of fruit and vegetables to Elena to feed her with, makes sweets and dinners and encourages Elena to pass them off as her own. She still asks them how she is every day. She still does everything that she can to make sure that Clarke is safe and comfortable because, in the end, that is all that matters to her.

 

Lexa knows that just knowing that Clarke is safe, and having Clarke know that she is here if she wants anything, is enough for her.

 

To her, this is the happiness that she never thought she was deserving of, the happiness that she never thought she’d have.

 

Just having Clarke in her sights is enough.

 

Watching her from afar is a gift. Seeing her explore and experience things in a way that Lexa’s people—her _society_ —would never have allowed her to do, is the best gift that she could ever hope to receive.

 

Because catching sight of Clarke interacting with people in the market, seeing her smiling and curious and unafraid, is something that Lexa never thought she would see. Seeing her lying on a makeshift bed in the middle of her garden surrounded by pillows and books with her head protected by the straw sunhat Fitz made her is miraculous. Watching her from afar as she strips off her pants and wades out into the sea and plays in the surf is beautiful.

 

Her quiet smile is infectious.

 

It makes Lexa feel at peace.

 

“I do not understand this,” Clio says to her one evening, when they are walking along the shore in companionable silence. “I do not understand why you still feel about her as you do when all she’s done is treat you unkindly. She is undeserving of this affection, Lexa.”

 

Lexa smiles and buries her hands in a nearby growth of soft orange flowers. She takes one from the ground, snaps and shortens the stem, before slowly twirling it in her fingers.

 

“The one thing that I have learned about the way I feel for her,” Lexa murmurs delicately. “Is that there is no understanding it. There is no way to analyze why this has happened, or what it is, or how it started. There is no way to stop it. I cannot stop it.” She shrugs. “I tried to deny this. I tried to pretend that it wasn’t happening to me—that my entire world wasn’t spinning out of place because of her—but it was _impossible_ , Clio.”

 

She licks her lips and shrugs.

 

“I cannot control these feelings,” she admits on a breath as she picks off random flowers as they walk and adds them to her small posy. “I could not control the way that they made me want to act irrationally, the way that they made me want to do things that I swore I would never do, the way that they turned me into something I never thought that I would become. I could not control them. So I gave in.”

 

“She has _ruined_ you, Lexa…”

 

Lexa shakes her head. “No,” she disagrees. “She hasn’t. I am happy. She is safe.”

 

Clio stops her from playing with the flowers and cups her face quietly. She looks at her carefully and Lexa stares back, trying to hide all the things that she doesn’t want her to see.

 

“I can hear you,” Clio begins quietly. “I can hear you telling yourself in your head that you are happy with the things that you are doing. I can hear you telling yourself that you’re okay with this.” She shakes her head. “You have the same face you had when _yu nomon_ told you that you were a _natblida_. You are lying to more than just yourself.”

 

Lexa breaks free from her grasp and walks away. She disappears up the shore and when Clio finds her again, she is sitting in the sand, looking out across the ocean still twirling the flower stems in her fingers. Clio sits beside her and there is silence for a long time. Lexa thinks that they have finished speaking but then Clio sighs.

 

“It is okay to be disappointed,” is all that she says. “It is okay to not be so polite all the time.”

 

Lexa nods and licks at her lips as they begin to tremble in warning.

 

Clio says nothing when the tears come. She offers no sympathy, she just sits with Lexa until they subside and the darkness covers them with a sky-filled with stars. They are the same stars that Lexa spent weeks staring up and wishing into. She wipes her face and rests her chin on her knees as she wraps her arms around them.

 

“I miss her,” she admits in a whisper.

 

Clio sighs.

 

When an arm curls around Lexa’s shoulders, it does little to help.

 

//

 

“What’s with the decorations?”

 

Elena looks up at her but doesn’t immediately answer. It’s not untypical but Clarke has noticed how the pauses between questions and answers have become longer, the silent sound of disappointment getting louder in the spaces. She knows that they have seen the truth of her now. They have seen her be cruel and unforgiving. They have seen the way that Lexa gladly takes all the bitterness that she throws at her and the way that it just makes Clarke angrier.

 

“There is to be a festival tomorrow,” Elena says eventually as they walk through the market.

 

Clarke looks around. “What for?”

 

Elena shrugs. “To celebrate life, I suppose,” she explains. “They held the last festival shortly after we arrived from Polis but Lexa was still too unwell to celebrate.” She glances at Clarke when Clarke quickly looks away. “We spent much of the festivities at her bedside.”

 

Clarke kicks at a nearby rock on the floor and waits patiently as Elena collects something from one of the vendors. “She appears to have recovered well.”

 

Elena chuckles mirthlessly under her breath and rolls her eyes. She keeps walking and Clarke waits for her to say something. She can see the words resting on the tip of her tongue. They’re almost back at Clarke’s cottage when she finally turns around.

 

“You should know, Clarke, that what things appear to be and what they actually are can be two _very_ different things.” She shoves the packages into Clarke’s arms and shakes her head. “I must go to Fitz. I will see you later.”

 

The ache in Clarke’s chest hurts and she feels her cheeks pink as she looks around to see if anyone is watching.

 

There is no one but she stops when she catches sight of Lexa’s garden. It is full of its colorful beds and baskets of flowers. Lush fruits hang off of every well cared for bush and tree. Every plant in Lexa’s vegetable garden is labeled with a precise piece of carved wood in front of it.

 

And amongst it all, Lexa lays asleep in the hammock between two fruit trees. One hand props under her chin and the other rests against her stomach. Her hair—unbraided and wild—whips around her face in the gentle ocean breeze. Bare feet hang off the side of the hammock, their bottoms covered in fresh earth, while the knees of her linen pants are covered in grass stains.

 

The ache in Clarke’s chest grows and she stays there staring until she feels someone walking towards her.

 

She is unsurprised to see Clio’s unimpressed face staring back at her.

 

“Hi,” Clarke says, desperate to ignore Clio’s increasing coldness.

 

Clio doesn’t greet her. “I need to check your stitches,” she says instead. “Some of them need to be removed.”

 

Clarke nods. “I’ll drop by tomorrow morning.”

 

Clio shakes her head. “Tomorrow afternoon,” she instructs. “I have another patient.”

 

Clarke nods in agreement and is not surprised when Clio lets herself through Lexa’s wooden gate and into her garden. She turns away quickly and begins walking the rest of the way back to her cottage with Elena’s packages in arms.

 

She waits for her to collect them later, for Elena to bring her an evening meal or to come and make sure she has eaten properly. She doesn’t, however, and Clarke finds herself walking up and down the small street that has become her neighborhood in hopes of seeing her. She tries not to glance over when she sees that Lexa is still sitting in her garden, a fire lit in the small pit before her and a mug of something in her hands.

 

She doesn’t say anything until Clarke suddenly finds herself loitering outside her gate.

 

“Have—have you seen Elena anywhere?” she asks, her nonchalance ruined by her sudden nervous stuttering. “She left some packages with me and I thought she was coming to get them.

 

Lexa takes a sip of her drink. “Fitz said something about them visiting friends at the other side of the island and that they would not be back until the morning.”

 

Clarke smiles politely and makes to leave until her stomach gives away her plight. Her cheeks flush and she glances up to find Lexa smiling at her. She holds up a finger for Clarke to wait and disappears inside her home, returning a few moments later with a dish covered with a plate for a lid. She brings it up her short cobbled path before handing it out to Clarke over the wooden gate.

 

“Chicken, and homegrown vegetables and potatoes,” she explains.

 

When Clarke just stares at the dish, she holds it out further.

 

“You are hungry, Clarke,” she says plainly. “You are hungry and I have too much food. Take it.”

 

Clarke takes it quietly and watches as Lexa moves back to her chair in front of the fire, picking up her mug and taking another drink.

 

“Thank you,” she whispers and Lexa just nods. She says nothing else but she watches as Clarke walks away and back to her cottage.

 

The dinner is hot, the portion generous. It is delicious and Clarke eats it appreciatively, unable to stop thinking that Lexa prepared and made this. By the time she is done, her stomach is full and she’s tired. She washes the dishes and leaves them on the counter, takes them back to Lexa the next day on her way to Clio’s. She’s almost disappointed when Lexa isn’t there, and leaves them on the small garden table outside instead.

 

She takes a slow walk to the clinic after that, watching as people prepare for the festivities that will happen later in the evening. Clio ignores her once she arrives in the clinic, speaking quickly and quietly to her assistants. Clarke settles in one of the chairs outside and waits, waits a long while, until Clio appears with a beckoning finger and draws her within the treatment room.

 

She says nothing as she prepares what she needs. It takes a while and Clarke watches in bemusement as she pointedly avoids small talk. Clarke knows that it’s because of Lexa and she says nothing, does as she’s told when Clio tosses her a hospital gown and gestures to the other room.

 

Clio looks over her injuries quietly before gesturing for her to lie on the treatment table. She quietly begins checking over the stitches on Clarke’s hips, removing the sutures from her skin and saying nothing at all.

 

The silent treatment becomes boring after a while.

 

“You’re mad at me,” Clarke comments.

 

Clio glances up at her and shakes her head. “Possibly the understatement of the century.”

 

Clarke rolls her eyes and chuckles. “I’ve done nothing to you, Clio,” she says. “Whatever issue you have, keep it to yourself. Not that it’s any of your business anyway.”

 

Clarke expects indifference. She expects a half-hearted apology. What she doesn’t expect is for Clio to throw down her instruments, remove her medical gloves, stand, and lean over her body threateningly.

 

“You are wrong there, Clarke,” she spits in warning. “You are causing my sister pain and that makes it every bit my business. Because that is who Lexa is. She is my sister. She is my family.”

 

There’s a protectiveness in Clio’s eyes that Clarke isn’t ready for and she says nothing as Clio continues to stare at her.

 

“Why are you here, Clarke?” she asks pointedly. “No one travels all this way for no reason. You claim to have not known that Lexa was here but you followed her map anyway. What were you expecting to find here?”

 

Clarke scoffs and shrugs. She attempts indifference.

 

“Her family,” she whispers. “I wanted them to know what happened to her.”

 

“An honorable task,” Clio whispers but she doesn’t sound impressed by the act. “Except the circumstances are not what you expected. You have found her _and_ her family and she is safe here, Clarke. She is making herself a new life. One that she never anticipated she would ever be allowed to have. If you would like to make that difficult for her then I suggest you go back to Polis and you forget the things you found here that make you so bitter and angry.”

 

Clarke sits up then, glad when Clio moves back too to accommodate her. She glares at her angrily and shakes her head. “You need to stop making excuses for what Lexa’s done,” Clarke says instead. “For what she _always_ does. She’s betrayed everyone. She betrayed her people and it’s not the first time she betrayed me. I’m allowed to be angry. I’m allowed to be—”

 

“Whatever you think you’re going through—whatever anguish you feel—do not be so _foolish_ as to think that she didn’t hurt, too,” Clio warns her and there’s a tone to her voice that is unforgiving. “Yes, she betrayed you, Clarke. She betrayed a lot of people. But you don’t know the things that Lexa has been through in her short life. You cannot begin to understand the responsibilities she has faced, the choices she has had to make. You forget that she was forced to choose between my death and my exile when she was barely a _child_. That she was made to choose between her responsibilities and her family and I have _never_ held her accountable for that because she was born with a purpose that many of us could never dream of.”

 

Clarke says nothing and bites her lip as Clio looks at her in disappointment.

 

“I watched the sweet, young girl she was become the cold, powerful _heda_ she thought she would die as,” Clio goes on angrily. “You can’t begin to understand what it’s like to see the person you love most in the world slowly become something that they _never_ wanted to be. I was fifteen years old when she was born. I helped bring her into the world. I have known her since she was nothing but an idea.” Clio’s eyes become glassy then and she shakes her head to rid the onslaught of sudden emotion. “I was there when her mother discovered the color of her blood. I was there to help hide it as long as possible and I watched who she became when she found out.”

 

Clarke listens and doesn’t know what to say. She knows so little of Lexa’s past that she just made assumptions for most of it. She knows that she was wrong to do so when she sees the uncharacteristic tears begin to streak down Clio’s face anyway.

 

“None of us will ever truly understand the anguish she put herself through when making the decisions she did—that is a burden I believe a person has to go through first hand—but the closest I will ever come to witnessing it is when she dealt with her decision to leave Polis and come here.” Clio’s eyes glaze over and it’s like Clarke isn’t even in the room anymore. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

 

When her startling blue eyes suddenly fix on Clarke’s, Clarke takes a deep breath.

 

“Imagine how you would have felt, waking up in the dark… in the back of the dirtiest, noisiest wagon on earth—your heart and head still groggy from the drugs given to you to slow your heartbeat to the point of near death—to find that someone is attempting to pull a bullet from inside of you with nothing to dull the pain…” Clio’s eyes darken and Clarke swallows thickly. “We had to pin her down and gag her to stop people from hearing and discovering her. She was delirious for _days_. All she did was cry for months. Even when we got here. Even once her delirium broke. She fought and she pulled her stitches so many times that I was worried her skin would never fix back together. She thrashed against a fever, cried out in pain, and—through it all—I was sure she would beg for death. I was sure that she would wish for it—especially once she realized what had happened, especially when the truth of what she’d done became clear to her—but there was only one thing that she wanted the entire time. There was only one thing she asked for night and day for weeks...”

 

Clarke glances up at her and swallows in anticipation. Clio sighs and shakes her head.

 

“And that was _you_ ,” she confirms. “She _begged_ for you. And when she came around from it all—sad and depressed and completely unaware of who she even was anymore—the _heda_ was gone. She didn’t exist anymore and all we had left was Lexa. Except no one knew who Lexa was. She didn’t even know herself—”

 

“I know who she is,” Clarke interjects and she’s surprised when Clio laughs.

 

“You are a fool,” she states. “You do not know her at all. You knew _Heda_. You do not know the sweet girl who loves flowers and doesn’t want to be unkind to anyone. The girl who would climb trees and sleep in the grass. The one who made up stories of a better world that seemed like fairytales until the reality of her responsibilities became clear. She used to speak of ending war and creating peace but she was too young and naïve to be aware of what that would entail and when she did she soon became cold and ruined.”

 

Clio’s face screws up in sadness.

 

“And can you imagine waking up as that girl again knowing what you’ve done to the people you love?” she chokes. “Can you imagine that, Clarke?”

 

When Clarke shakes her head, Clio nods and sits down on her stool. She picks up her tools and resumes her work quietly for a long time before shaking her head.

 

“When she was delirious, she would talk about you, and the way she spoke about you made you sound like an angel,” Clio tells her softly. “I thought that you would have to be to deserve her. But now I’ve met you, and I’ve come to know who you are, and there is only one thing I am sure of and it’s this: She was the greatest commander in one hundred years and you _broke_ her.”

 

She looks up at Clarke and shakes her head in disappointment before she throws down her tools again.

 

“So here’s my question,” she whispers gravely. “What makes you so special, _Klark kom Skaikru_? Because I don’t see it…”

 

Clarke says nothing.

 

She doesn’t know.

 

//

 

Clio looks shaken when she comes for an early dinner.

 

She doesn’t answer Lexa’s questioning look and, instead, embraces her in a way that she hasn’t done in many months. Her arms wrap around Lexa’s body and she touches her hair and her back. She rubs it just like their father used to but it feels like she’s doing it more for her own benefit than Lexa’s. She presses gentle kisses to Lexa’s hairline and Lexa just holds on and waits for the shower of affection to end.

 

But it lasts for a long time and Lexa finds gentle noises leaving her lips when Clio clings to her desperately. She scratches at Clio’s blonde hair and reaches up to wipe her damp cheeks when they pull apart.

 

Clio smiles and tucks wayward dark hair behind Lexa’s ears.

 

“I am very glad that you are here,” Clio tells her softly. “I am incredibly proud of the woman you’ve become. I love you so very much and I don’t know what I would have done, if I hadn’t been there that day, if I’d lost you. You are the only thing I have.”

 

Lexa shakes her head in disagreement but feels another burst of happiness that she has her sister back, that she’s able to finally embrace her rather than exhibit the clandestine behavior they were forced to endure throughout Clio’s exile. Much of her life is filled with guilt and regret but Clio has never made her feel such things. She has always made her feel wanted and loved.

 

“I am here because of you,” Lexa whispers. “I will be forever grateful that you could reunite us. That we are a family again.”

 

Clio chuckles and cups her cheek. “Our family has always been small,” she comments. “But it is mighty.”

 

Lexa leans forward to kiss her sister’s cheek and smiles fondly. “A creed that could only have come from a father with two short daughters and no sons.”

 

“You are not wrong,” Clio hums as she releases Lexa and moves over to the table where their meal is set out.

 

She settles in her usual chair and pours tea from the pot that sits on the table. She makes sure that their cups are well sweetened as Lexa fetches the bread from where it is keeping warm in the stove and brings it to the table. This normality is something that she did not anticipate she would ever be allowed to have and she pauses to press a kiss to the top of Clio’s head before she settles in the seat beside her.

 

Clio has a mouth full of food when Lexa smiles and stares.

 

“If she had not have come,” she whispers carefully. “I think I would have still found happiness here.”

 

Clio looks up at her in surprise.

 

Lexa shrugs. “I’m relieved to be here with you.”

 

A hand takes hers as blue eyes looks at her sadly.

 

Clio has that same look she came through the door with and Lexa waits for clarity and understanding.

 

“Dearest,” Clio whispers in a soft, sad voice she’s barely able to possess. “You know that isn’t true. You know that you’ve been waiting for her since you arrived here, since you came round from the delirium. You know that you’ve been waiting for her every moment since.”

 

Lexa worries her hands in her lap and stares down at them until Clio lifts her chin to force her gaze.

 

“Your heart is so innocent and pure,” Clio whispers. “No wonder you hid it for so long. It knows more than your head ever will. It knows the words to say that will solve your heartache. Its instincts are better than your head’s will ever be.”

 

Lexa sighs and shakes her head. “Clio…”

 

“I will never understand why you gave your heart to someone like her,” she states. “I don’t believe that she deserves you. I don’t believe that she can protect and care for something so delicate and wonderful… But I am aware that she is the key to your happiness… that you _yearn_ for her acceptance and forgiveness. I just wish that you could make her see the sweetness inside of your heart that I’ve known since the moment I first held you in my arms.” She chuckles. “I wish that you would realize that being _heda_ didn’t make you brave… because you were a thousand times braver before you became her.”

 

Lexa blinks away the tears. She swallows against the words that never fully form in her throat and instead takes a mouthful of her food.

 

“We must eat,” she says instead. “The festival is starting soon and people will be expecting us.”

 

Clio smiles knowingly and they eat in silence.

 

//

 

It’s unlike anything she’s seen before on the ground and more like festivities on the Ark than anything else.

 

It’s odd and Clarke watches from the sidelines like she’s dreaming, unsure whether to believe what she’s seeing from the way that people pile into the streets and become overwhelmed with happiness and jubilation.

 

In Polis, when the new leaders of the coalition announced that the threat of war and danger was over, people had been quietly relieved, tired, and glad that they were safe. Celebrations had been personal between families and villages. There had been some parties but Clarke had been too drunk to remember most of them. There had been one for the people left of the Ark but she never went. She never felt like there was much to celebrate.

 

But this celebration is not for any reason. They are celebrating because it’s what they want to do—that it makes them _happy_ —and Clarke finds it bewildering, that there is so little to be concerned with here that celebrations are meaningless. They have no other purpose than to bring joy.

 

And she’s still quite unsure of how to feel joy.

 

She had been surprised when Elena had visited her that afternoon and collected her packages, bringing with her another that she had presented to Clarke and told her to wear to the festival. They had reiterated to her the point that their friends had made to them: that it was important to look their best for celebrations and that dirty shirts and trousers with worn out knees would not do.

 

Clarke had found a dark green dress hidden beneath the brown paper that Elena had handed her. The fabric was soft, silky. The cut accentuated parts of Clarke’s body that she’d long since forgotten to trouble herself with. It had reminded her that she still had curves—a body—regardless of the weight she’d lost in the last year. It reminded her that she was still a young woman—still pretty, still worth something—even just for the few moments she stood at the mirror in the bathroom. Her body was no longer a warrior, or a weapon, or a force to be reckoned with. She was just a young woman with an entire future ahead of her.

 

She was a survivor.

 

“You look lovely, Clarke,” Elena had said when they collected her to make sure she attended the festival. She had pressed a shawl into Clarke’s arms to protect from the chill and had pulled it around her when more than one young man paid attention to her chest.

 

It was something Clarke hadn’t had to worry about for a long time.

 

The festival was larger than she expected, held on the wooden boardwalk by the sea, just beyond where they hold the market each day. The vendors still remain there, selling their wares as well as other special items especially for the festival. Clarke eyes them all carefully until Elena drags her to where a large band is playing those familiar yet unrecognizable songs, and people are already dancing and laughing and having fun.

 

She becomes so swept up in the bright assault of enjoyment to her eyes that she almost misses the sight of her.

 

She hates that when she does see her, everything else seems to dull in comparison.

 

A deep breath pulls into her lungs and she watches her regardless of who might see.

 

She looks at her and remembers Clio’s words, tries not to think about a barely-alive body in the back of a wagon begging for her, tries not to think of her half-delirious and feverish, uttering nonsense words to people about a woman they might never get the chance to meet.

 

She spent most of the afternoon wondering what Lexa could have said about her—what such tall and flattering tales could have been told about her—that could have led to such anger and disappointment.

 

She feels like yet another myth, another dream, and it makes Clarke hate her just a little bit more for perpetuating yet another tale about her to the people who could have offered her a fresh start.

 

She’s just glad that they’re unaware of her reputation as the commander of death.

 

But all those thoughts disappear completely at the sight of her and she would be lying if she said she didn’t cross her arms so that she could pinch herself and check if she’s dreaming. And she would be lying if she said that seeing Lexa wearing a dress didn’t remind her of dreams she’d had too many times before, dreams of meeting Lexa on the Ark, of having more time together, of seeing her happy.

 

When the pinch doesn’t wake her up, when it becomes clear that Lexa is real, she feels her heart skip an uncontrollable beat.

 

She’s beautiful—undeniably so—and all Clarke can think about is an afternoon long ago spent exploring the soft body she knows is beneath that dress, of the smiles that she was sure she’d never get to witness, and the happiness that she wasn’t ever sure the ground could give her.

 

Lexa laughs and Clarke has to look away because that is not something she ever thought she would ever get to witness either. It was another on a long list of things that she only ever dreamed of.

 

She doesn’t argue when Elena and Fitz lead her to where she’s standing. She does notice how Lexa’s eyes widen in surprise and her body stiffens in anticipation when she gets there. Her hands fold over each other at her front and she smiles kindly as Elena shuffles in closer to greet Clio who stands beside her. They talk quietly to each other, Clio explaining things to them as they admire their surroundings. Clarke becomes too quickly aware that Lexa is watching her instead of what’s happening around them. It doesn’t bother her, not until Elena and Fitz disappear to dance and someone calls Clio away.

 

But then, it doesn’t really bother her after either.

 

It just makes her nervous.

 

“Hello, Clarke,” Lexa whispers as she breaks the awkward silence. Clarke notices that she anxiously plays with her fingers, while her eyes dart everywhere like she doesn’t know where to look.

 

It makes her lips quirk in a smile.

 

“Hi, Lexa.”

 

Lexa bites her lip. Her hands smooth over the delicate flower pattern of her dress. Clarke tries to watch what’s going on around her, tries to smile at Elena and Fitz as they dance by them, but is hyper aware of Lexa next to her and of Clio spying on them from across the square. They watch the people dancing for a long time in awkward silence. It’s long enough that Clarke begins to notice the way that her heels are starting to make the arch of her foot ache, and for the music to begin to slow down enough that the children leave the dance floor.

 

It takes another three songs before Lexa turns to her with purpose in her expression.

 

“Would you like to dance with me, Clarke?” she blurts before her face falls in surprise and she swallows thickly. “Or perhaps we could get some wine, or food or—”

 

“Do you even know how to dance?” Clarke interjects curiously. She remembers how Fitz had practically pulled her around when they danced at Clio’s.

 

Lexa’s face pulls together.

 

“No,” she whispers. “Not really.”

 

“Good thing it’s a slow one then,” Clarke comments.

 

She doesn’t anticipate how much of a mistake she’s making until Lexa takes the hand she offers her, until they’re walking out into the crowd and turning towards each other. She doesn’t think about the sudden rush of emotions that overwhelm her the minute that they’re inches from being pressed together, until Lexa’s arm is wrapped around her waist and she has to put her own around strong shoulders. Soft hair litters over her skin and she shivers with the urge to tangle her fingers in it, her body suddenly beginning to tremble when she knows she can’t.

 

And what makes it worse is that Lexa notices and she instantly holds tighter like she knows that Clarke needs it. She pulls her closer until their bellies are flush together and their feet are side by side. Lexa’s hand touches her skin and it feels like fire, like Clarke’s body wasn’t fully alive until that very second. Lexa sways them enough that they don’t look out of place and watches her carefully until Clarke can’t take anymore. She lets go of her like she’s been stung and flees.

 

Her feet move beneath her and they lead her back to the beach near her cottage. She’s breathless by the time she gets there and she’s unsurprised when she hears someone approaching behind her.

 

“I’m sorry,” Lexa whispers and Clarke is mindful of her dress as she settles to sit in the sand. She makes no arguments when Lexa sits down beside her a few feet away. “I’m sorry, Clarke. I’m sorry that I hurt you. That I broke my promise to not betray you again. And I know that I have no right to ask anything of you—that I deserve so very little—but if there is any part of yourself that you’re someday willing to share… I would be grateful for it.”

 

When Clarke stands, Lexa does too. She watches as Clarke scoffs and paces in the sand. She doesn’t quite understand what she’s feeling or why she’s feeling it.

 

“How do you expect me to do that, Lexa?”

 

Lexa swallows and clutches her hands in front of her. Her eyes are glassed over and Clarke tries not to be affected by it. She keeps pacing. She wants to feel angry. She wants to feel rage instead of whatever this is that she’s actually feeling.

 

“I have tried to show you my sincerity,” Lexa whispers. “I have tried to express my guilt. I have given you all of what I could think to give you, Clarke. I have attempted to atone, to make up for the hurt I have caused. I have been patient—”

 

“Patient?!” Clarke spits. “You’ve atoned?! At least you got down on your knees and _begged_ last time.”

 

She doesn’t understand why she’s surprised when Lexa suddenly kneels in her path and prevents her from pacing.

 

Bright green eyes stare up at her and Clarke frowns as tears streak down Lexa’s face silently. A hand reaches up and clutches at the hem of Clarke’s dress and stops her from trying to get away. Lexa’s other hand presses at her stomach, right where Clarke had pressed to stem the bleeding.

 

Just the memory makes her feel nauseous and frustrated and dizzy.

 

“Tell me what to do,” Lexa begs in a whisper. “Tell me. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything. Anything you wish.” The words begin to hiccup from within her as her voice turns tiny and breathless. “I’ll do all of it. Whatever you ask. I’ll do anything.”

 

Clarke looks away to save face and shakes her head. There are a million different worries in her head than the ones that are coming from her mouth. She is unconcerned with betrayal and lies but she doesn’t feel she can reveal the truth. She stubbornly shakes her head and reaches down to pull her dress from Lexa’s grasp.

 

“You got what you wanted from me,” Clarke murmurs as she begins to walk away. “Don’t expect me to give you anything else.”

 

She gasps when, seconds later, hands grab and spin her around as Lexa gets to her feet.

Lexa’s eyes flare in angry warning and her tears don’t stop. For the first time, Lexa looks at her and Clarke doesn’t see the knowing recognition that used to make her feel at ease, used to make her feel safe and understood. She looks disappointed in Clarke for more than her refusal. She looks disappointed in the person that Clarke has become.

 

“You think I got what I wanted from you?!” she says sadly and angrily. “I haven’t got _half_ the things I dreamed of having with you, Clarke!” She angrily wipes at her nose. “My life has been dictated by rules and responsibilities for longer than I can remember and there are things that I’m supposed to want—the things that I’m supposed to need for my people—and there are the things I dream of when I am alone, the things I long for in private that I know I’m not supposed to have.”

 

Clarke sighs, bored of the constant talk of duty and responsibility, and tries to remain unshaken when Lexa blocks her path as she tries to walk away.

 

“For so long, all I wanted was the peace and safety of my people. I wanted prosperity for them. I wanted them to no longer live in a world full of war and suffering. I wanted the unity of a people who had fought for so long to achieve those things…” she says angrily. “And then I met _you._ I met you and you were everything that the long-since silenced parts of myself had longed for. You were everything I couldn’t have.”

 

Her voice breaks and Clarke allows herself to glance over Lexa’s shoulder as she moves closer to her.

 

“I wanted that someday with you more than anything else I’d ever wanted before,” Lexa chokes. Clarke expects her to censure or hide herself soon but she doesn’t. “I wanted those afternoons spent in my chambers sitting in silence with you for the rest of my life. I wanted to talk about the entire world with you, Clarke. I wanted us to explain the universe to each other. I wanted to see how long it would take to exhaust each other’s minds, to hear every thought you ever have about anything. I wanted to be with you long enough that you would look at me and I would no longer have to speak because you would already understand every single part of me. I wanted to know what you look like when you are happy and content, instead of angry, and scared and disappointed. I wanted _everything_ , Clarke, but I was born with a _responsibility_! A responsibility that I never wanted, that I never asked for!”

 

“Then you should have run away like Luna!”

 

Fury flares in Lexa’s expression. “I am _not_ a coward!” she yells in a voice that would make the _Heda_ proud. “This was the only option I was given that satisfied every need and wish I had, even if it’s potential outcome was based on faith and hope alone!”

 

Clarke laughs mirthlessly and moves closer to Lexa. They’re practically nose-to-nose when she speaks.

 

“You can keep telling yourself that but it doesn’t change the fact that you betrayed every single person you swore to protect!” Clarke says lowly and gravely. “You betrayed every person who ever loved and cared for you, who fought for and believed in you! You betrayed them. You deceived them. You _lied_ to them—lied to _me_ —for something you were entirely unsure would be achievable, for something you _knew_ had a higher chance of failure than success. You listened to the goddamn voices in your head instead of your heart. You deserted your people when you knew that they could come to harm. We all could have _died_ and you ran away. You _ran_ away like a coward. You _are_ a coward!” She feels satisfaction as she watches Lexa’s expression change and transform, becoming more and more hurt and offended. “You are a shameless fool. You are a dishonor to the people you swore to—”

 

“I gave up everything for the sake of my people and the woman that I _love_!” Lexa roars despite the tears that continue to roll down her cheeks. “There is _nothing_ more honorable than that…”

 

Clarke opens her mouth to argue back but finds that she’s unable to.

 

The words echo in her head to the point where she can’t fully comprehend them.

 

She watches as Lexa’s pants in rage, her back straight and prepared for war. She feels her own expression fall as the words fail to fully register and then she sees as Lexa’s does the same, falling into shock and shame and awe. She gasps and steps back protectively.

 

Clarke frowns and feels all the fight drain from her body for reasons she doesn’t understand yet.

 

Despite the sluggishness of her own brain, she feels herself utter out a breathless, “Say that again.”

 

Lexa looks scared and she steps back further. Clarke soon realizes that it’s because her own feet have taken a step towards her.

 

“Clarke—” she tries but Clarke shakes her head.

 

“Say it again,” she whispers. “Tell me again.”

 

Lexa shakes her head. “Clarke…” she begs.

 

“ _Say it_.”

 

Lexa’s expression changes quickly and slowly at the same time.

 

Clarke expects her to turn brave but instead she softens. She doesn’t understand how someone defiantly lifting their chin as they swallow nervously can look so beautiful and delicate but it does. Lexa’s tears roll to a stop and she sighs before the words leave her.

 

Her voice shakes as she speaks in a whisper.

 

“You are the woman I love.”

 

_Months of wondering, regretting, wishing_ … a voice at the back of her mind reminds her. All she can think about is a conversation with her mother in which she expressed her doubts, in which she had nothing to reassure herself with. In all the days since she woke up, she hadn’t paused to realize that her anger meant she was not getting the answers she thought she’d spend the rest of her life waiting for.

 

She takes a deep breath and her shoulders slump in surrender.

 

“Again,” she sighs and she feels like a dam broken. The emotions so long held back and held in come crashing over her in waves, drowning her with feelings that she quickly feels dizzy with.

 

Lexa’s expression implores her silently to have mercy. She shakes her head and whimpers when Clarke looks away and stares down at her own body, at the sand beneath her feet, at the world around her, the position she suddenly finds herself in, and the empty, broken shell of a person she’s become.

 

“Clarke, I’m sorry,” Lexa whispers. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t—I have _no right_ to say such things, to assume that you want to listen to them, to—”

 

She trails off when Clarke looks up, when she sees the fast tears rolling down Clarke’s cheeks, the hope-filled relief that fills her eyes and the validation she’s been waiting too many days for.

 

Lexa sees it and she _knows_.

 

“Say it again,” Clarke chokes and she’s glad that Lexa needs no further invitation to move forward and desperately reach for her. Their fingers tangle together and it’s about as much contact as Clarke can take. The mere sound of Lexa’s breathing is suddenly too much. It fills her with too much relief.

 

But it doesn’t take long for a hand to lift to her face and for fingers stroke over the swell of her cheek briefly before Lexa drops to her knees in the sand before her again. Her green eyes are full of the same awe Clarke found the second time they kissed, the awe that encouraged her to never stop kissing Lexa if she could help it. Lexa takes one of her hands and all Clarke can recognize is how warm her skin is.

 

“You are the woman I love,” Lexa whispers bravely as her hand presses to the center of her chest. “You have my entire heart. You have my body and my soul.”

 

When Clarke’s hand finds her face, she smiles in relief and her tears resume.

 

“I _love_ you,” she chokes softly, sweetly, and Clarke feels like she’s been waiting one hundred years to hear the words. “I love you, Clarke.”

 

She falls to kneel opposite her because she needs her closer, but also because her legs are threatening to collapse from beneath her body. Lexa reaches for her waist to steady her and sighs.

 

“I thought you knew,” she says as her hand sweeps over Clarke’s brow briefly. “I thought you always knew and you didn’t want me to say it. I thought you didn’t want to hear it.” She smiles and Clarke lets a sob choke from within her. Her own regrets seem so silly and Lexa must see because she cups Clarke’s face in her hands and wipes the tears away. “But you must know, that I am yours, Clarke Griffin…”

 

Clarke chuckles at hearing her name from Lexa’s lips and listens to her as she speaks so softly and breathlessly that only Clarke can hear.

 

“You must know that even if you had made me wait all of my days, only to forgive me on the last one… that I would still be inexplicably grateful for every last second.” Her watery smile is infectious and Clarke sighs as she reaches up to touch Lexa’s face in return. “It would still be worth it.”

 

She tilts her face and admires her like she is the finest thing she’s ever seen.

 

“You made me want to _live,_ Clarke,” she chokes. “You made me see that I could. That I deserved to. And I would give you anything you asked for. Anything at all…”

 

Clarke cannot help the sobs that whimper from her and Lexa seems unfazed by them. She tilts their foreheads together and what strikes Clarke most is her smell and the electricity that radiates from her skin, the magnetic pull that their bodies seem to have to each other.

 

“Not that I have much anymore,” Lexa whispers around a smirk that Clarke quickly returns. “All I have is this…” She chuckles as her hands cradle Clarke’s face. “A tired, _wasted_ body and a desperate, aching heart.” Lips press gently against her nose reverently before Lexa nuzzles against it with her own. “They are all I have but you can have them. You can have every single piece of me, Clarke. I’m entirely yours.”

 

Clarke wants to fall into her arms in the same fashion that she fell in love with her: thoughtlessly and wildly. She wants to mesh their bodies together until she gets what she has spent too many months grieving for. She wants their bodies to become so carefully entwined that it would be impossible to tell them apart. She wants her heartbeat to be the same as Lexa’s. She wants each breath she takes to be one that Lexa exhales. She wants to be tied to this woman forever but the fear that this is a dream is so overwhelming that she shudders with the terror of it.

 

“What if this isn’t real?” she chokes, grabbing for Lexa’s dress to hold her close.

 

Lexa laughs at her and presses their cheeks together. Her skin is warm, if a little chilled. It is also damp with her tears. “It is real.”

 

“I can’t hold you because I’m terrified that I’ll never be able to let you go,” she breathes as her hands hold back from sweeping over every curve and angle of Lexa’s body. “I can’t lose you anymore.”

 

Lexa smiles and pulls her closer. Clarke shudders when she feels Lexa’s body against hers and the vibrations of her existence. Their noses press and Clarke sighs at the feeling. Her eyes flutter closed and she allows herself to momentarily enjoy the feeling of Lexa touching her face, her back, her hair.

 

“Kiss me, Clarke,” she whispers into the hairsbreadth of space between their lips. “Kiss me and you’ll see that there is nothing to worry about.”

 

_This is madness_ , Clarke thinks as Lexa’s hands cup her cheeks again. _That’s what this is. I’ve finally gone mad._

 

But when Lexa’s mouth touches hers, nothing about that seems to matter.

 

If this is madness, she never wants to be sane again.

 

//

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
